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THE 



RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD 



APPLIED TO 



EDUCATION 



BY 



ANTONIO ROSMINI SERBATI 



TRANSLATED BY 



MRS. WILLIAM GREY 



BOSTON 
D. C. HEATH AND COMPANY 

1893 






Copyright, 1887, 
By D. C. heath & CO. 

Transfer 
^i' Engineers School tUby, 

June 29,1931 



PEEFACE. 



The work translated in the following pages was not published 
till after the death of the author, and is, in fact, only a frag- 
ment of a much larger work, which he had planned, and in which 
the education of the human being was to be carried on, through all 
the stages of life, on the principle of natural development here laid 
down and applied to infant education only. He rightly entitled it 
"The Ruling Princii^le of Method in Education," for it is the 
principle on which Nature herself works ; and its applications, as 
given by Rosmini, and almost contemporaneously, though quite 
independently, worked out by Froebel, in his Kindergarten sys- 
tem, constitute the true art of education, founded on the science 
of human nature. I cannot better introduce the reader to the 
nature and scope of the work, and the history of ife composition 
and publication, than by extracting the account given of them 
in the " Preface addressed to Italian Educators," prefixed to the 
original, by its editor, Francesco Paoli : — 

" Towards the end of 1839 Antonio Rosmini undertook this work 
on Pedagogy, the occasion of his doing so being apparently the 
offer of a pious and generous-minded woman, Anna Maria Bolor- 
garo of Stresa, to intrust to the Institute of Charity (the order 
founded by Rosmini) the management of the elementary school 
which her grandfather had founded in that place, and which was, 
in fact, undertaken by the Institute in the following year. Ros- 
mini's aim, however, was not to compose a mere manual for elemen- 
tary schoolmasters, but rather a complete treatise on Pedagogy, and 
to give a new instance of the fecundity of his philosoi^hical system 
and its application to the art of bettering human life, parallel to 
those he had already given in his ' Rights of Man ' (Diritto), his 

ill 



IV PREFACE. 

< Politics/ his ' Treatise on Conscience,' and in his ascetic works. 
Pedagogy is thus included among the sciences of application, 
directed to form a philosophical doctrine and to fecundate philoso- 
phy and render it fruitful. Rosmini rested it immediately upon 
Anthropology and Psychology, giving the knowledge of the human 
faculties to be educated and theu' modes of action ; on Idealogy 
and Ethics, giving the objects, both proximate and ideal, by 
which the human faculties must be stimulated, in order to be 
properly educated ; on Ontology and Theology, giving the knowl- 
edge of the ends towards which the human faculties should har- 
moniously tend, to find in them rest and full satisfaction, which 

is the ultimate goal of human education Nor did Rosmini 

intend to treat only, as is generally done, of that part of human 
education which relates to childhood. He had in view also the 
adult and the old, the whole race, in short, because in the man, at 
every stage of life, there is something of the child ; there is a new 
development going on v\ithin him, which requires to be guided and 
assisted that it may reach a successful issue, and the man learn to 
educate himself. Hence, Rosmini divided his subjects into periods 
of life, computed, not by numbers of years, but by the degrees of 
cognition which the human mind successively attains in its intel- 
lectual development. The first of these periods begins at birth, 
and includes about six weeks. No definite cognitions can be as- 
signed to this period, although it must have the primary and 
fundamental cognition of being, without which the new-born in- 
fant would not be human, for it would not have the light of rea- 
son The second period begins with the first smile and tears 

of the infant, — that is, generally about the sixth week ; and its 
cognitions consist only of the simple perception of things as 
subsisting, to which correspond the volitions, termed by Ros- 
mini affective, instinctive, which have these things for their object. 
This period ends with the child's first articulate word, — as a rule, 
about the end of the first year. Speech is the sign that the child 
has entered the third period, and that he has attained the second 
order of cognitions, formed by analyzing the first, and by abstract- 
ing the more interesting, sensible qualities of things from the 
ideas of the things in his mind (imaginal ideas); and to these 
correspond the affective volitions, having for their object these 



PREFACE. V 

more interesting, sensible qualities abstracted from the actual 
things, and from the other qualities to which the appetitive faculty- 
is indifferent. The fourth period begins usually at about three 
years of age, and shows itself in the aptitude to learn to read. 
We have now the exercise of the judging faculty, which has 
become capable of connecting by synthesis the elements of the 
previous analysis, and of affirming the existence in a subject of 
the qualities before abstracted, constituting the cognitions of the 
third order, to which correspond the volitions appraising the various 
objects of which these qualities are affirmed. This is soon followed 
by the cognitions of the fourth order, — consisting in the compari- 
son made between two objects previously analyzed, — and the judg- 
ment of appreciation, giving the preference to one over the other. 
To this order of cognitions correspond the appreciative volitions, 
choosing between two objects ; and the moral sense, which existed 
in germ in the preceding periods, now takes a larger development. 
About this time appears the first dawn of conscience, manifested 
in the volitions resulting from cognitions of the fifth order. These 
cognitions consist in a synthesis by which are determined the rela- 
tions existing between two things combined into one, and con- 
ceived as one, of which conceptions the most important is that of 
the I and of self-identity. This period would seem to extend to the 
time when, as is commonly said, the child acquires the use of rea- 
son, or, as should rather be said, the free use of it, since the use of 
reason begins at the earliest period of life, and is manifested in 
the smiles and tears of the infant of six weeks old ; for the brute 
neither smiles nor weeps. 

" The work of Rosmini only reaches to this period. But from a 
short memorandum which I found written, in his own hand, on 
a small piece of paper, as was his custom, it would seem that he 
intended to treat of four following periods, which he would doubt- 
less have subdivided, as before, by years of age. I found that, in 
the period from the seventh to the twelfth or fourteenth year, he 
proposed treating of the work performed by the mind through 
more and more developed reflection, towards attaining the con- 
scious (reflective) knowledge of moral obligation and of law, to 
which corresponds a greater freedom of action. And I believe he 
would there have given the demonstration of what he had more 



Vi PREFACE. 

than once said to me, that on that period principally depends the 
moral character of the man, for good or evil, through life. For 
the young and inexperienced mind throws itself wholly and with 
undivided energy into the acts it performs, which thus have a 
greater fulness of life and force than those of adults. Hence, the 
first moral or immoral act, deliberately performed, stamps on the 
moral character a good or evil impression of such tenacity that it 
makes virtue more or less easy throughout the whole remainder 
of life. He then notes that the period of adolescence, extending 
from puberty to a little beyond the twentieth year, is that in which 
the youth, having attained sufficient reflective power and acquired 
clear notions of law, of duty, and of goodness, becomes master of 
himself, and can, and ought to, attend to the practice of private and 
individual virtues, by which he more and more educates himself. 
Then follows that other period of life in which the man applies 
himself to contemplate things as they are in themselves, rising 
thence to the thought of that which is eternal and necessary. Par- 
allel with this thought, Rosmini appears to place the man's activity 
in working out the eternally beautiful through literature and the 
fine arts ; in defending, by word and deed, the eternally just, and 
the inviolable rights of humanity; in giving aid and succor in 
various ways to his fellow-creatures ; and, hence, he calls it the 
period of action. Finally comes the last period of life, which he 
names the age of counsel and the age of repose or w^isdom, after 
which follows the decay of the man. 

"From the fact that liosniini approximately assigned to each 
period a certain definite limit of age, it is not to be assumed that 
the period or the capacity of individuals is to be determined by 
years of age. So far is this from being true, that we not unfre- 
quently find youths who are men in sense, and men who remain 
childish triflers into old age. The periods are defined and made to 
depend necessarily on the orders of cognition ; and, from the rela- 
tion and graduation of the latter, we are shown how impossible it 
is to rise to the higher without having first passed through the 
lower. 

" It was the intention of Rosmini, as appears from the title of 
the manuscript, to complete the work in five books ; but unfortu- 
nately of these we have not quite two, the sixth section of Book II., 



PREFACE. Vll 

which treats of the nature of the cognitions of the fifth order and 
the corresponding activities, but lacks the last two chapters, giving 
the instruction and education appropriate to that order. I had 
hoped to find some note or memorandum to supply, at least in 
part, this grievous loss, but my hope proved vain. I found nothing 
referring to the later books, beyond the memorandum given above, 
and, as regards the two missing chapters of the sixth section, only 
the following heads : ' Chap. III. Instruction. God, all-knowing, 
the rewarder of good and evil. Chap. IV. Education. Reason 
comes to the aid of obedience. Communication with the reason of 
others. How reason should correct sympathy. At this point the 
child should be guarded from temptations to falsehood. Means of 
cultivating truthfulness in the child. The rule against falsehood is 
ideal, and therefore weak. Ridicule is hurtful to children : things 
should be treated seriously. Praise and blame can be understood 
at this time. I think they might begin to be used then. If rightly 
bestowed, they help the conception of moral dignity. To give 
praise or blame earlier than this is useless, for they cannot be 
understood. Rule. — When the child has come to have moral 
principles and feels remorse, his conscience begins to give him a 
rule of action. In what the religious element of morality at that 
period consists.' This memorandum is so slight that I might have 
omitted it ; but I have inserted it here, that I may be able to affirm 
that the manuscript is published entire, just as it was found." 

Every reader of the above notices must share the regret of the 
writer, Francesco Paoli, that Rosmini has left us only a fragment 
of a w^ork so nobly planned. It is clear that, had life or leisure 
enough been granted to him, he would have given the world — 
what it has never had yet — a complete method and art of educa- 
tion, based on the applied science of human nature, and having for 
its aim and end the full and harmonious development of the latter, 
to the measure of the stature of the perfect man. Fortunately, the 
earlier part, which is preserved to us, contains the fundamental 
principles both of method and practice, which remain the same for 
all periods of life, and of which only the application varies with 
the varying degrees of individual development. If the former are 
thoroughly mastered, together with their groundwork in the laws 



viii I»REFACE. 

of human nature, the latter will be a comparatively easy task. I 
would point out here, what I have referred to in notes in various 
portions of the following translation, how far that task has been 
accomplished for us by Froebel, whose Kindergarten system, 
worked out by him in entire ignorance of Rosmini, and under 
conditions of birth, education, circumstances, so widely different, 
is yet the complete application, to every detail of infant education, 
of Rosmini's principles, or rather of the principles common to 
both, because both had arrived at them by the same road, — the 
profound study of human nature. 

On one point only they differ ; namely, as to the direct dogmatic 
religious instruction to be given to young children. This differ- 
ence was inevitable between a priest of the Church of Rome, the 
founder of a religious order under Papal sanction, and a Protest- 
ant lay-teacher, devoutly religious, indeed, but not confining his 
faith within the four corners of any theological formula. Rosmini, 
as could not be otherwise, based the practical religious education 
of the child on instruction in the dogmas and formularies of the 
Church. Froebel, on the other hand, with a consistency impossible 
to his great contemporary, refused to depart in religious instruction 
from the fundamental principle of both, that children should never 
learn words representing ideas which their minds were incapable 
of conceiving; and thus, while his whole teaching was imbued 
with the spirit of religion and directed to lead the infant mind and 
heart to the love and adoration of God, he excluded from it all 
dogmatic formulas given in words which the child could not 
understand. I must be allowed here, in justice to myself and my 
own profoundest convictions, to express my emphatic dissent from 
my author in this matter, not only as to the method of his relig- 
ious instruction, but as to its matter, where that involves any of 
the distinctive dogmas or practices of the Church of Rome. I 
could not have undertaken this translation, had I not been per- 
mitted to make my standpoint on this question perfectly clear, 
and to enter this protest against any supposed acceptance of those 
passages of the work which inculcate such dogmas or practices. 
They are, indeed, singularly brief and rare in this fragment of the 
much larger work which Rosmini had projected, in the later por- 
tions of which dogmatic religious teaching would, we can scarcely 



PREFACE. ix 

doubt, have taken a larger place ; but, slight as they are, I feel 
bound in honesty to record my dissent as an individual from what 
I render as a translator. 

I have striven to make my translation as faithful as possible. 
Only in one or two instances I have omitted notes that had no 
interest for any but Italian teachers, as referring to Italian school- 
books, now out of date, or that gave redundant quotations in sup- 
port of points fully established already. I have also occasionally 
condensed my author's somewhat diffuse illustrations ; but in no 
case have I omitted or altered anything in the substance or logical 
order of the text. I may add, that for such slight variations and 
omissions as I have madfr I had the full sanction of an eminent 
member of the Rosminian Order, at whose request I undertook 
the translation. 

I cannot close this Preface without expressing my deep obliga- 
tions to Mr. Thomas Davidson, who, when I was disabled by severe 
illness from continuing the correction of the press, most kindly 
undertook it for me, and superintended the final revision of the 
whole work, — a task for which his profound knowledge of Ros- 
mini peculiarly qualified him, but which I cannot sufficiently thank 
him for undertaking in the midst of his own engrossing literary 
labors. He will find a better reward than my poor thanks in the 
consciousness that, without his aid, the English-speaking public 
would have been deprived for an indefinitely longer time of so 
valuable a contribution to the science and art of education as that 
afforded by the great Italian thinker in the work of which this is 
a translation. 

MARIA G. GREY. 
Rome, January, 1887. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO BOSMINI . . . . xix 
INTRODUCTION 3 

BOOK I. 
ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Chap. I. — On the gradations which must be observed in the 
mental operations required of children .... c ... . 12 

Chap. II. — The gradation of mental operations depends on the 
gradation of objects to which the attention of children is di- 
rected • 13 

Chap. III. — On the natural order in which objects present them- 
selves to the human mind, first discerned in classification . . 15 

Chap. IV. — Continuation. — Method of teaching children the 
classification of things 16 

Chap. V. — Continuation. — Order in which objects present them- 
selves to the human mind in the local distribution of things . . 29 

Chap. VI. — On the natural order in which objects are presented 
to the mind in abstract reasoning 34 

Chap. VII. — Recapitulation 37 

Chap. VIII. — Natural and necessary order of intellectual action 38 

Chap. IX. — Ruling principle of method 39 

xi 



Xll CONTENTS. 



BOOK II. 

ON THE APPLICATION TO LITTLE CHILDREN OF THE 
RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

PAGE 

SECTION I. — On the Necessity of Classifying the Cogni- 
tions OF THE Human Mind according to their Order 41 

SECTION 11. — On the Cognitions of the First Order and 

THE Corresponding Stage of Education 45 

Chap. I. — Which are the cognitions of the First Order .... 45 

Art. I. — What is the stimulus which primarily excites the 

intellectual attention of man ? 47 

Art. II. — What is the object of the primary cognitions ? . . 47 

Art. III. — What are perceptions 1 48 

Art. IV. — Of what improvement the human perceptions are 

capable • 51 

Art. V. — To the First Order of cognitions besides percep- 
tions belong also the memory of perceptions ; the imaginal 
ideas ; the associations of the three species enumerated, 
together with the whole action awakened by them in the 
mind 56 

Chap. II. — On the activities which respond to the First Order of 

cognitions 59 

Art. I. — Distinction between the two first periods of child- 
hood 59 

Art. II. — Activities proper to the First Period 61 

Art. III. — Activities proper to the Second Period .... 66 

Chap. III. — On the education and instruction of the child through 
the two first periods of life 73 

Art. I. — On Religion 73 

Art. II. — The 9,cts of the will are stronger in childhood than 
in adult years 74 

Art. III. — The tendency of education in early childhood 
should be rather to cultivate feeling and volition than in- 
tellect 76 

Art. IV. — The actions produced by the animal feelings are - 
connected by the laws of nature : the earliest volitions, and 
the intellectual feelings consequent upon them, are in them- 
selves disconnected 77 



CONTENTS. Xlll 

PAGE 

Art. V. — Observations and experiments tlie child should be 

led to make 79 

Art. VI. — The educator should regulate the perceptions of 

the child 80 

Art. VII. — Patience and sagacity required by the educator 

for this purpose 80 

Art. VIII. — Order to be introduced in the perceptions of 

the child 81 

SECTION III. — On the Second Order of Cognitions and 

THE Corresponding Education 84 

Chap. I. — Third period of childhood 84 

Chap. II. — What are the cognitions of the Second Order ... 85 

Art. I. — What are the cognitions of the Second Order in 
general 85 

Art. II. — Two kinds of cognition beyond the reach of the 
mind at a certain period of life, — the one because it is of 
too high an order, the other because it does not attract the 
attention, which lacks the necessary stimulus 85 

Art. III. — What is the motive which impels the child 
towards cognitions £)f the Second Order 89 

Art. IV. — The two kinds of cognition to which language 
impels the child's intelligence 91 

Art. V. — What are the cognitions gained by the child 
through language 91 

Art. VI. — What are the cognitions of the Second Order 

given to the child through language 93 

§ 1 . — Abstractions formed immediately from sensible things 96 

§ 2. — First classification of sensible things 104 

§ 3. — Integration . 106 

Chap. III. — Development of the active faculties in the Third 
Period of childhood 107 

Chap. IV. — Of the teaching corresponding to the Second Order 
of cognitions 112 

Art. I. — Four errors to be avoided by teachers 112 

Art. II. — The gain to the mind from the regularity with 
which perceptions and imaginal ideas have been imparted 
in the preceding period 113 



XIV CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Art. III. — Matter and instrument of instruction, — language 11-1 

§ 1. — Tlie child should be taught to name the greatest 

possible number of things 114 

§2. — Limits of this instruction 114 

§3. — Double practice in language, — natural and artificial 115 

§4. — Continuation. — Artificial practice 117 

Chap. V. — Education of the active faculties corresponding to 
cognitions of the Second Order ' 125 

Art. I. — Difficulty of determining which should be the nega- 
tive and which the positive part of education 125 

Art. II. — Difficulty of determining how much the teacher 
should give the child and how much he should require from 
him 127 

Art. III. — What is the moral rule of the child arrived at 
the Second Order of cognitions 133 

Art. IV. — Can the morality of the child be injured while he 
is still in the second stage of cognitions 1 138 

Art. V. — How to make use of the child's faculty of belief, to 
incline him to moral goodness 142 

Art. VI. — Other means towards the same end 143 

Art. VII. — On resistance, considered in relation to the 
Third Period in childhood 146 

§ 1. — Exercise of patience which may be required of the 

child 147 

§ 2. — Correction of the child's conceptions 147 

§ 3. — Rectification of bad feelings 149 

§ 4. — Removal of the limits too easily set to the benevolent 

affections 150 

Art. VIII. — Acts of religious worship which the child should 
begin to perform at this age 160 

SECTION IV. — On the Cognitions or the Third Order and 

THE Corresponding Education 166 

Chap. I. — The Fourth Period of childhood, and the difference 
between the periods and the orders of cognitions 166 

Chap. II. — On the mental progress made at that age with regard 
to the cognitions of the preceding orders and the concomitant 
development of the other faculties 168 



CONTENTS. XV 

PAGE 

Chap. III. — On the cognitions of the Third Order 169 

Art. I. — What are the cognitions of the Third Order in 

general 1 169 

Art. II. — Method we shall follow henceforth in the exposi- 
tion of human development 171 

Art. III. — Processes by which the mind arrives at cognitions 

of the Third Order 173 

§ 1. — Cognitions of the Third Order are always reached 

through synthetic judgments 173 

§ 2. — AVhat is contributed by analytic judgments to the 

Third Order of cognitions ,176 

§ 3. — Catathetical ratiocination at this period 178 

Art. IV. — Objects of the cognitions of the Third Order . . 179 

§1. — Reality and ideality 179 

A. Collections, numbers 179 

B. Definite principles 186 

§ 2. — Morality — moral principles 189 

Chap. IV. — Development of the active faculties in the Fourth 

Period of childhood 192 

Art. I. — Increase of spontaneous activity 192 

Art. II. — Desultoriness of action 194 

Art. III. — Play 195 

Art. IV. — Moral activity 197 

Chap. V. — The instruction corresponding to the cognitions of 

the Third Order 202 

Art. I. — What is meant more fully by instruction corre- 
sponding to a certain order of cognitions 202 

Art. II. — The language and style to be used by the teacher 202 

Art. III. — ^[atter of instruction 204 

§ 1. — Action 204 

§ 2. — Oral exercises 204 

§ 3. — Teaching by pictures . . . > 210 

Chap. VI. — The moral education corresponding to the Third 

Period 211 

Art. I. — On the objective principle and the subjective prin- 
ciple on which the child acts at this period 211 

Art. II. — On resistance, considered in relation to the child 

in the Fourth Period 215 



XVI CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Art. III. — Divine worship 216 

SECTION V. — The Cognitions of the Fourth Order and the 

CORRESPONDING EDUCATION 217 

Chap. I. — Cognitions of the Fourth Order 217 

Art. I. — Classification of the cognitions of the Fourth Order 217 
Art. II. — Mental processes in the formation of cognitions of 

the Fourth Order 218 

§ 1. — Analytic judgments 218 

§ 2. — Synthetic judgments 220 

§ 3. — Hypothetical ratiocination 221 

Art. III. — Objects of the cognitions of the Fourth Order . 222 

§1.— Reality and ideality 222 

A. Differences . 222 

B. Numbers 223 

C. Collections 224 

D. Means and end 224 

E. Intellectual perception of one's self (of the I proper) 224 

F. Time 232 

G. First definite principles drawn from the ideas of 

actions 234 

§ 2. — Morality, moral principles, conscience ..... 245 

§3. — Idea of God 250 

Chap. II. — Development of the active faculties of the Fourth 

Order of cognitions 254 

Art. I. — With the Fourth Order begin appreciative volitions 255 

Art. II. — Freedom 256 

Art. III. — How belief and docility naturally increase in the 

child 258 

Art. IV. — Desire to influence others 260 

Chap. III. — Instruction adapted to the Fourth Order of cognitions 261 

Art. I. — How language should be the fomidation of all in- 
struction of the young . . . . ^ 261 

Art. II. — Exercise of external activity, of imagination, mem- 
ory, and the affections 263 

Art. III. — Oral exercises in this period 265 

Art. IV. — Instruction in reading and writing 266 

Art. V. — Arithmetic 270 



CONTENTS. XVll 

PAGE 

Art. VI. — Unification of ideas and thoughts 270 

§ 1. — Association of ideas 272 

§ 2. — Order of ideas 275 

§ 3. — Moral order of ideas 278 

Chap. IV. — Moral education corresponding to the Fourth Order 

of cognitions 283 

Art. I. — The child's credulity should not be abused . . . 283 

Art. II. — Obedience not to be abused 286 

Art. III. — On maintaining the rectitude of the child's con- 
science 287 

§ 1. — How the will of the educator, which is the child's 

supreme law, should be good 291 

§ 2. — The will of the educator, being the child's supreme 
law, should be good with a goodness the child can 

recognize 292 

§ 3. — How the child should be led upwards'from the knowl- 
edge of the goodness proper to the human will, to 

knowledge of the goodness proper to the Divine will . 295 

SECTION VI. — The Cognitions of the Fifth Order, and the 

Education corresponding to them . . . . o , . 300 

Chap. I. — The development of intelligence which takes place in 

the Fifth Order 300 

Art. I. — Processes by which cognitions of the Fifth Order are 

formed 301 

§ 1. — Synthetic judgments of the third species .... 301 

§ 2. — Analytic judgments of the Fifth Order 304 

§ 3. — Disjunctive ratiocination ^if 305 

Art. II. — Objects of the cognitions of the Fifth Order . . . 307 

§1. — The real and the ideal 307 

A. Numbers 307 

B. Order of value between objects 307 

a Time 308 

D. Cognition of the I 309 

§2. — Morality, moral principles 311 

A. Beginnings of remorse and conscience 311 

B. Moral principles in the fifth order. — Duty of moral 

fortitude 310 



XVm CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

C. Duty of honoring the will of the most worthy before 

all others 318 

2). Beginning of abstract moral principles, as distin- 
guished from the concrete 323 

E. Increased difficulty of right moral conduct, from the 
appearance in the mind of abstract moral standards 326 

F. Difficulty of perfect truthfulness for the child . . 328 

G. How the three categorical moral principles begin to 
manifest themselves clearly at this period . . . 332 

§ 3. Notion of God 333 

Chap. II. — Development of the active faculties and of the moral 
condition of the child in the Fifth Order of cognitions . . . 334 
Art. I. — Development of the child's imagination ; mainly 

caused by definite principles regarding the action of things 334 
Art. II. — Moral advantage of the development of the imagi- 
nation 340 

Art. III. — Moral injury from the development of the im- 
agination 345 

Art. IV. — Self-consciousness of the child at that age, consid- 
ered in relation to morality. — Moral injury. — Selfishness 353 
Art. V. — Continuation. — Two degrees of selfishness . . . 355 
Art. VI. — Continuation. — Judgment by two measures. — 

Childish artifices 356 

Art. VII. — Moral apathy and restiveness . 357 

Art. VIII. — Moral advantages of self-consciousness . . . 359 
Art. IX. — Continuation 360 



■^ 



SKETCH 



OF THE 



LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINL' 



Antonio Rosmini Sp^ubati was born on the 25th of March, 1797, 
at Rovereto, in the Italian Tyrol. His father, Pier Modesto Rosmini 
Serbati, belonged to an old, wealthy, and noble family, originally called 
Aresmino or Eresmino. His mother was a Countess Giovanna dei For- 
menti, from Riva, on the Lake of Garda. Both, like many of their an- 
cestors, were cultivated, generous, and pious people, zealously devoted 
to the service of tlie Church, but do not seem to have been in any 
other way remarkable. Antonio was a delicate and finely organized 
child, and very early showed signs of those virtues of head and heart 
for which he afterwards became remarkable, as well as of that relig- 
ious and devotional tendency which gave aim to his whole life. Being 
fond of study, he entered, when still very young, the gymnasium of his 
native town, and there so distinguished himself that the rector was 
able to predict, in no indefinite terms, the boy's future greatness. After 
leaving the gymnasium he remained two years at home, studying 
mathematics and philosophy, for both of which he early displayed 
great tendency and capacity. It was in the course of these two years 
(1815-1810) that two of the most important events in Rosmini's life 
took place, — the discovery of his philosophical principle, and his de- 
termination to enter the priesthood. Firm in the latter resolution, 
and having overcome the strong opposition of his parents, he left 

1 This sketch is a summary of that given by ]Mr. Thos. Davidson in his work, 
"The Philosopliical System of Antonio Eosmini Serbati" (London, Kegan Paul 
& Co., 1882 ; Boston, Gmn & Co.), whicli I recommend to tlie perusal of all who 
wish to make themselves acquainted with the nature and extent of the services 
rendered to philosophy by one of the greatest thinkers of modern times, so little 
known as yet out of his own country. 

(xix) 



XX SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. 

^overeto in 1817, jmd began his theological course at the University of 
Padua. In 1820 lieTost his father* who left him heir to the bulk of his 
very considerable property. In 1821 he was ordained priest, and cele- 
brated his first mass at St. Catherine's in Venice. 

From 1820 to 1826 Eosmini spent the greater part of his time at his 
home in Eovereto. It was during this time that the two great pur- 
poses which shaped his whole subsequent life became clear to his 
mind, — the working out of a coherent system of truth, which should 
be a basis for revealed theology, and the founding of an institution 
which should train teachers, and especially priests for the Church, in 
holiness, charity, and wisdom. At first he meant that it should consist 
of laymen, but afterwards concluded that an association composed in 
part of priests would be more useful. In February, 1828, he left Milan, 
where he had mostly lived since 1826, and retired to Domodossola, a 
small but beautifully situated town in the Piedmontese Alps. Here 
he led the life of an anchorite, feeding on boiled herbs, frequently fast- 
ing, sleeping on a couch of leaves, and spending his time in prayer, 
meditation, study, and writing. His naturally delicate health broke 
down under the strain, and he never fully recovered. It was here that, 
kneeling before a crucifix, he wrote the Eule of his order, and here that 
he composed a large part of his first important work, " The New Essay 
on the Origin of Ideas" ^ (Nuovo Saggio sulV Origine delle Idee), which 
wasi^rinted during his subsequent stay in Rome from November, 1828, 
to March, 1830, and which at once established his reputation as the 
ablest Catholic philosopher of his time, and was almost immediately 
introduced as a text-book into many schools and seminaries, even, it 
should seem, into those under the control of the Jesuits. During this 
stay in Rome he received great encouragement from the Pope, Pius 
VIII., to pursue his philosophical studies, and took steps toward ob- 
taining the approval of the Holy See for his new order. 

From 1830 to 1834 Rosmini lived partly at Domodossola, partly in 
Trent, where he had been invited to found a house of his order. In 
these years he wrote his "Principles of Moral Science," part of his 
"Supernatural Anthropology," and in 1832 his now famous "Five 
Wounds of Holy Church." In 1834 he was called by the clergy and 
people of his native city, Rovereto, to take charge of the congregation 

J Translated into English, and published by Kegan Paul &; Co., London, 1884, 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. XXI 

of St. Mark's there; but, finding himself hampered in his efforts to 
improve the moral and spiritual welfare of his parishioners by the 
jealous opposition of the Austrian government, he resigned his charge 
in 1835, and at once returned to his previous mode of life. But the 
Austrian government, having once had its attention called to his work 
in Rovereto, began to look with suspicion on his efforts generally, 
and to endeavor to counteract them. With this purpose, it first for- 
bade all connection between his house at Trent and any foreign house, 
meaning the one at Domodossola, and finally succeeded in breaking 
it up altogether. This hostility to Rosmini was sharpened by the 
influence of the Jesuits and their friends, who saw in his enterjDrises 
possible dangers to their order. From that time until now the per- 
secution of Rosmini and his followers at the hand of the Jesuits has 
never ceased even for a moment. Freed from parochial duties, Ros- 
mini during the years 1836 - 37 moved a good deal from place to place, 
trying to secure a footing and sympathy for his order, and to defend 
the groundwork of his philosophy, which was already vigorously at- 
tacked, not only by the Jesuits and their friends, but also by learned 
men of rationalistic and anti-Catholic tendencies. In these years he 
was able to found a mission in England, and also to establish, at the 
Sacra of St. Michele in Turin, a religious house, to which he trans- 
ferred, for a time, the novitiate of his order. 

In 1837 Rosmini, tired of Austrian surveillance, took up his abode 
at Stresa, on the western shore of the Lago Maggiore, which remained 
his home for the rest of his life. His institution, in sj)ite of bitter oppo- 
sition, received in 1839 the formal approval of Pope Gregory XVI., his 
old and steadfast friend, and continued to increase in strength and 
numbers. He was able also to vindicate his philosophy from the for- 
midable attacks of Count Mamiani, the able and zealous Italian patriot, 
who acknowledged his defeat in the most generous terms, and of Vin- 
cenzo Gioberti, the great priest-patriot and patriot-philosopher of Italy, 
who also lived to admit that he had misjudged him altogether. His 
reply to Gioberti appeared in 1848, that year of so many changes, when 
Italy was struggling to free herself from the bonds of the hated Aus- 
trian. Rosmini is usually spoken of as one of the initiators of the 
movement which ended in the emancipation and union of Italy ; and 
it is true that he sincerely longed to see Italy delivered from the Aus- 



XXll SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. 

trian ; but, like a good, consistent Catholic, lie hoped this deliverance 
would result in placing the country under the control of the Pope. It 
was this longing and this hope that stirred up the interest which he 
felt in the political movements of that troubled time, and induced 
him to take part in them. 

In 1848 Rosmmi wrote his " Constitution according to Social Jus- 
tice," and published his " Five Wounds of Holy Church," written as 
early as 1832, the ultimate aim of both being to procure for the Pope 
an inalienable preponderance in the government of Italy, and to make 
Catholicism a leading article in her constitution. Shortly after the pub- 
lication of these works the Piedmontese government offered Rosmini, 
whose influence at Rome was supposed to be great, an appointment as 
special envoy to the Holy S.ee, in order to obtain the countenance and 
aid of the Pope, then Pius IX., in the prosecution of the war against 
the Austrians. Rosmini accepted the mission with readiness, but un- 
fortunately, while the government which appointed him contemplated 
an armed alliance of princes, capable of offering immediate resistance 
to the Austrians, what Rosmini meant to labor for was a permanent 
confederation of states, with the Pope as ex officio president. The gov- 
ernment, however, was induced by Gioberti to adopt for a moment 
Rosmini's plan, and, with a vague understanding to this effect, Rosmini 
started for Rome, where he was most graciously received by the Pope, 
appointed a Consultor of the Congregation of the Index, and prom- 
ised a Cardinal's hat, and immediately began to carry out the object 
of his mission, as he was fain to understand it. But the Piedmontese 
government, fearing that his plan, which was approved by the Pope 
and the Duke of Tuscany, might prove successful, sent him instruc- 
tions to abandon it and confine himself to the project of an armed 
alliance. This led to Rosmini's resignation, at the end of seven weeks, 
the effect of his influence upon the Pope having been to prevent his 
listening to the Piedmontese proposal, and to confirm him in his res- 
olution to take no direct part in the war. This resolution brought 
about the crisis which began with the foul assassination of the minis- 
ter Rossi, and ended with the Pope's flight to Gaeta. In the interval 
between these events Rosmini, who was supposed to represent the 
views of patriotic Piedmont, was suggested as a member of the liberal 
ministry forced upon the Pope, and was by him made president of it, 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. XXlll 

with the portfolio of Public Instruction. But Rosmini's almost mor- 
bidly scrupulous conscience, his sense of incapacity, and, more than 
all, his fear that his appointment had been made under pressure, and 
would place him in a false position with the people, induced him to 
decline the nomination and keep himself out of the way. For what- 
ever reason, his influence with the Pope ceased from that moment. 
Nevertheless, he followed him in his flight to Gaeta, but found his posi- 
tion there, exposed to the malign suspicions of Antonelli and the party 
in favor, so uncomfortable, that he betook himself to Naples, thus leav- 
ing the field open to his enemies. The latter, aided by the Neapolitan 
government, which, for reasons of its own, persecuted him during the 
whole time he remained within the limits of its jurisdiction, succeeded 
in calling at Naples an irregular meeting of the Congregation of 
the Index, which pronounced a decree prohibiting his recently pub- 
lished works, " The Constitution according to Social Justice " and 
" The Five Wounds of Holy Church." Rosmini, though a Consultor 
of the Congregation, was not informed of this meeting, nor was it till 
some months later, when he had withdrawn to Albano from the petty 
persecutions of the Neapolitan government, that he received the news 
of the prohibition. He submitted to it at once without protest, and 
offered to withdraw his books from circulation ; but this was not 
deemed necessary. His enemies had succeeded in surrounding his 
name with an odor of heresy, and they were satisfied. He shortly 
afterwards returned to his home and his former saintly life at Stresa. 
He lived but seven years more. During these he devoted himself 
exclusively to the care of his institute and' the composition of works 
forming part of his great system of truth. His enemies, who had been 
baffled for a time by his hearty submission to the decree prohibiting 
his two patriotic works, now began a systematic process of calum- 
niation, in order by mere reiteration to convince the Pope that Ros- 
mini was a heretic, and a man dangerous and hostile to the cause of 
the Holy See. To their dismay, however, they soon found that they 
had overshot their mark. The Pope knew him personally, and before 
that knowledge calumny fell dead. Besides, being now restored to his 
throne, and free to think for himself, Pius IX. saw that he had deeply 
wronged Rosmini, and resolved to make what reparation was in his 
power, by giving him a fair hearing. He first enjoined silence on Ros- 



Xxiv SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. 

mini's enemies, and then had the whole of his published works sub- 
mitted to the most careful scrutiny. The result of this process, which 
lasted nearly four years (1851-54), was that at a meeting of the Con- 
gregation of the Index, the Pope presiding in person, it was declared 
that all the works of Antonio Rosmini Serbati, lately subjected to 
examination, were to be dismissed as free from censure, and that, on 
account of the said examination, no obloquy should attach either to 
their author or to the institution founded by him, " de vitse laudibus 
et singularibus in ecclesiam promeritis." The Pope then enjoined 
perpetual silence on Rosmini's enemies, whose fury in consequence 
knew no bounds, and from that day to this has not exhausted itself. 

Rosmini did not live long to enjoy the satisfaction he must have 
felt. He died the death of a saint, at Stresa, on the 1st of July, 1855, 
not without suspicion of having been poisoned. His remains rest in 
the crypt of the Church of the Holy Crucifix, which he built. Over it 
is a handsome monument by Vela, representing Rosmini on his knees, 
in the attitude in which he wrote the Rule of his order. In the college 
attached to the church is the working part of his library, his manu- 
scripts, and many interesting relics of him. 

In regard to the institution which he founded, a few words must suf- 
fice. Its proper title is the Listitute of the Brethren of Charity (Istituto 
del FratelU delta Carita) ; but its members are better known by the 
shorter name of Rosminians. The fundamental principle of it is com- 
plete surrender of the will to the will of God, waiting in faith on the 
promptings of the Holy Spirit, and its aim the moral perfection of 
souls through obedience to every law human and Divine, natural and 
revealed. The principle of all action is to be charity, material, moral, 
intellectual, " the love of the good, of all the good." The Brethren of 
Charity undergo a two years' novitiate, take the three monastic vows 
of obedience, poverty, and chastity, wear no distinguishing habit, and 
conform to the laws of thfe country in which their lot may happen to 
be cast. Each retains a sort of title to his own property, but makes 
a continual sacrifice of it, by disposing of it as the general of the order 
enjoins. The order, as such, owns no property. In spite of unscru- 
pulous opposition, it is in a fairly prosperous condition, and if its 
members are not numerous, those who have entered it are among the 
most human-hearted men and the truest Christians that the present 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF ANTONIO ROSMINI. XXV 

world has to show. They are almost exclusively Italians or English- 
men. The order has two novitiates, one at Domodossola in Pied- 
mont, and one recently removed from Rugby to Wadhurst in Sussex 
(England). It has also several colleges and religious houses in various 
parts of Italy and England. 

" When we say," writes Mr. Davidson, " that Rosmini was a saint 
and a thinker of the very first order, we have given in brief the main 
features of his character A man who, without courting pub- 
licity or fame, labored for forty years to do the good as he under- 
stood it. The good which he sought to do met with many obstacles 
in his lifetime, and many more since that came to a close; but his 
order still keeps alive his spirit of piety, hope, and charity, and his 
works, in spite of all wilful misrepresentations, calumny, and denunci- 
ation, are slowly, but surely, extending their influence in every direc- 
tion where influence is desirable Wq may differ with him in 

many, even fundamental, views and beliefs ; but we need not, and cer- 
tainly shall not, thereby be prevented from admiring his purity of 
heart, his unselfishness and tenderness, his singleness and indiverti- 
bility of aim, the vastness of his knowledge, and the penetrating force 
of his intellect. Neither need we be deterred by theologic prejudice 
from examining his works, and respectfully accepting the truths they 
contain. By such acceptance we shall be hastening the justice which 
time is certain, sooner or later, to accord to him and them."i 

1 The Philosophical System of Antonio Rosmini Serbati, by Thos. David- 
son, pp. xlviii., xlix. 



ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OP METHOD. 



INTRODUCTION. 



1. Method is a part of logic, and, if taken in all its bear- 
ings, may be said to be itself logic, since the aim of the 
latter is throvighout to establish the method of conducting 
our reasoning processes. But the present work does not 
consider method under this wide extension of its meaning. 
We must begin, therefore, by laying down the limits within 
which we shall confine our essay. 

2. The human mind has truth for its object, and, in 
relation to this most noble object, it exercises various 
functions. Some of these functions relate to truth already 
known ; others, to truth which is still unknown, and the 
knowledge of which is sought for. 

3. The functions of the mind, in relation to truths already 
known, may be reduced to three, namely, 1. The communi- 
cation of it to others; 2. The defence of it; and, 3. The 
disentanglement of it from error. 

4. The functions of the mind, in relation to truth as yet 
unknown, and which it seeks to know, may also be reduced 
to three, namely, 1. To find the demonstration of the truths 
known ; 2. To find the consequences to be derived from 
fchem through their development and application ; and, 3 
and lastly, to attain through the senses, by observation 
and experience, new data on which to base entirely new 
arguments. 

5. Each of these functions of the human mind has its own 
method, which consists of an assemblage of rules for the 
guidance of the mind itself in the performance of its work : 

(3) 



4 INTRODUCTION. 

hence we may distinguish six kinds of metliod, as we have 
distinguished six functions of the mind in relation to truth. 
6. These are, the method of exposition^ which teaches 
how best to impart our knowledge to others ; the polemical 
ynethod., which teaches us how to defend truth and repel its 
assailants ; the critical method^ which teaches how to sepa- 
rate the true from the false. These are the three methods 
which must govern our mental processes in relation to truths 
already known. The remaining three are, the demonstrative 
method^ which gives the rules for arriving at exact demon- 
strations ; the inductive^ which teaches how to reach the truths 
yet unknown, through inductions and conclusions from the 
known, developing from the knowledge we have ascertained 
in germ, as it were, the far larger body of that which we do 
not know ; and, finally, the method we shall call the percep- 
tive-inductive^ which is not satisfied with arriving at new 
cognitions by inductions and conclusions from previously 
known data, but which leads us to the discovery of wholly 
new data through the perception of new phenomena, skil- 
fully produced and made apparent to our senses. These are 
the three methods which govern the functions of the mind in 
relation to truths yet unknown. The last alone is the experi- 
mental method proper, the Baconian, to which is due the im- 
mense progress of physical science in modern times. ^ 

1 It is an error to believe that each of these metliods has a mode of reasoning 
special to itself. Lord Bacon was wrong in his notion that, in the j^^i^cptive- 
inductive method, induction should be substituted for the syllogism. His inaccu- 
rate dictum was, however, repeated as an echo from one end of Europe to the other 
without arousing distrxist m any quarter. The truth is, that every induction neces- 
sarily includes a syllogism, and that the syllogism is the intrinsic form of all 
human reasoning alike, not confined to one special method of reasoning, but 
common to all methods. There is, however, a basis of truth in the Baconian 
doctrine, although its expression is erroneous, and it is this: It is true, 1. That, 
in the exposition of physical and experimental facts, it is unnecessary to use the 
syllogistic form, which would be long, tedious, and pedantic ; 2. That the progress 
of the physical sciences does not depend so much on reasoning as on the new data, 
the new phenomena which are discovered by observation and experiment, so that 
the reasoning process serves principally to guide the observer and experimenter 
towards the discovery of the new facts he is looking for. 



INTRODUCTION. 5 

7. Now, of all these methods, the first alone, which gives 
the rules for imparting truths to others, is the subject of the 
present work. The rest requke special treatises, all, how- 
ever, being, as we have said, included under logic, of which 
this essay does not pretend to be more than a fragment. 

But, besides being a fragment of the science underlying 
the art of logic, it is also something else, — I will venture 
to say, something more. 

8. The expository method^ which is the subject-matter of 
the science of correct reasoning, gives the rules by which 
our knowledge can be duly imparted to others, and is there- 
fore the method which governs teaching in general. But, 
the method being given, the master or teacher, whoever he 
be, must himself apply it to his scholars ; and that applica- 
tion, that use of the rules of method by the master in dealing 
with his pupils, is in itself an art having fixed principles, 
the distinct knowledge of which is most useful to him. To 
gather up, order, and simplify these principles is the busi- 
ness of pedagogy, the science which gives the rules of the 
great art of education. It is to this science of teaching that 
we have turned our thoughts. Caring little to bring out 
through subtle research merely speculative laws of thought, 
we should leave such an undertaking to others richer in 
leisure than ourselves, were nothing further involved in 
the matter. But we are urged on by the needs of so many 
deserving teachers, who daily confess having to proceed 
tentatively, without sure guidance, in the vast and perilous 
field of instruction, and constrained by their complaints over 
their wasted labor. "We are moved also by our affection for 
the young, and by charity towards our kind, — towards 
humanity ever perishing through age and decay, and ever 
renewed in the fresh and vigorous life of new generations. 
These, like green shoots from an old trunk, promise at first 
all charms of beauty, all abundance of fruit, but soon fall 



6 INTKODUCTION. 

away and wither from want of proper treatment, — of able 
hands to shield them from external injmT, to uphold and 
strengthen them in their weakness, to save them from sink- 
ing miserably downwards, to get lost and choked among the 
briars and brambles, and creep and rot, leaving then- race no 
better, if not worse, than before. 

9. It is a fact that, at the present time, the want of a clear 
and well-grounded method is universally felt in our schools. 
The principles of such a method are being widely sought, 
and gradually discerned and gathered up, partly from the 
meditations of the ablest intellects, partly from the experi- 
ence of the best teachers. This should be an encourage- 
ment to all who are laboring in the same field and can hope 
to do something towards supplying this great need, to throw 
themselves into the common work with all the strength they 
have. At the same time, it is evident, from the differences 
of opinion and aims, and the diversity of ways adopted l)y 
individual educators, as well as by thek disputes among 
themselves, that the art of method is still wanting in a firm 
basis accepted by all, and which could, when understood, 
be rejected by none. Even the governments which have 
undertaken the du-ection of education, and possess all the 
requisite authority, still proceed with uncertain steps ; and 
while, on the one hand, the education under the control of 
the state is carried on with greater regularity, on the other 
the schools placed under these uniform and unchangeable 
rules are almost always the last to admit improvements, and 
either oppose any attempt to introduce them, by excluding 
the experiments which might lead to them, or, if any foreign 
discovery be adopted, its external form only is taken, while 
the kernel and inner spu'it of it is left aside. These are the 
reasons which have determined us to give tliis work rather 
a pedagogic than a logical character, and, although, in so 
far as it deals with the principal rules of the expository 



INTKODUCTION. 7 

method it belongs to the art of tliiukiug, yet, by taking tliose 
rules, and applying them in the first instance to the teach- 
ing of youth, it becomes a part of the art of education. 

10. Whether we have attained the object we have set 
before us in this book it is not for us to judge. Time 
alone, which develops the seeds of doctrine cast In^ authors 
into the field of human society, as it develops those cast by 
the husbandman into the earth, can prove it by its fruits. 
Meanwhile, if only these pages can afford some, be it ever 
so little, help towards the right training of our youth, I shall 
feel that my time and thought have been abundantly well 
spent. If otherwise, it will not, perhaps, be altogether 
useless to have set on foot a bonajlde discussion of questions 
relating to a matter of such importance. At the worst, sup- 
posing the world to gain nothing from what I have said, 
those who love their kind will, I hope, give me credit for the 
intentions which led me to undertake this task, and will 
feel their hearts beat in unison with mine. I go on now to 
show briefly from what point of view I propose to treat the 
subject, so as to avoid too much repetition of what has been 
already well said by others, and to gather up the arguments 
into that unity wherein lies the test of then- validity, and 
which is the pure and primal source of all science. 

11. There may be many special rules in the expository 
method, nor are these unknown ; but it appears to us that 
not only would each gain in clearness if all were referred 
to one, but that the careful observance of the method itself 
would be much facilitated by the use of one instead of 
many. By the faithful application of that one, we should 
also find without further trouble what we are seeking, ^. e. 
the regular procedure of the mind in reasoning. For this 
reason, we propose to direct our inquiry to finding out the 
ruling principle whence is derived the whole method of 
exposition, — an attempt which, we believe, has never yet 



8 INTKODUCTION. 

been made. This essay will thereby assume a scientific 
character ; for in no subject can we arrive at scientific exact- 
ness and a true system, until its more special divisions have 
been classed under the more general, and the latter under 
the most general of all, whence all are derived as from 
the fountain-head. In this last alone is there rest for the 
human mind, which is never satisfied till it has reached this 
final link of the chain, the ultimate most simple and absolute 
reason. 

Should we succeed in reaching this height, far from feeling 
weariness or fatigue, we shall find refreshment and delight 
in beholding the vast fields below us, which we shall survey 
at a glance in all then- aggregate relations, their order, and 
the wonderful variety of their phenomena, and shall be able, 
without effort, to take in all their parts, and measure their 
relative value. In other words, the mind in possession of 
a comprehensive scientific principle can grasp the multitude 
of ever-new conclusions which flow from it, develop and 
arrange them in their due order, and, by bringing them into 
comparison, assign to each its place and value in relation 
to the rest. We will therefore at once take in hand this 
main inquu-y, through which we shall arrive by degrees at 
all the other questions we have to deal with, deriving them 
with ease as corollaries from the first. 



BOOK I.^ 

ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

12. "It is an old maxim in common use, that whosoever 
will rightly learn great things must not attempt to grapple 
with their whole extent at once, but must begin with their 
smaller and easier parts." '^ 

This rule of method laid down by Plato was declared 
by him to be, even in his time, as old and commonly ac- 
cepted as it is self-evident. It would be a great mistake, 
however, to underrate a maxim because it has become trite. 
It is rather the habit of the best and profoundest minds to 
find the deepest wisdom in those truths which are the most 
common, which every one knows and repeats, which none 
can dispute, and none avoid seeing. But to do this we 
must look far below their common aspect to their inward 
depth and power, where lie the true foundations, the true 
reason, of whatever is accepted as scientific. As it is, how- 

1 This book was published by Prof. Dom. Berti in the form of an appen- 
dix to his work on Method Apj^Ued to Elementary Teaching (Turin, 1849) with 
the name of Prof. Tarditi. No moral blame can be attached on this account 
to Rosmini, Tarditi, or Berti. Rosmini wrote the book in 1839 ; Tarditi had read 
and copied it for his own use in 1845; and Berti, having found it among his papers 
after his death, published it as a thing worthy to see the light. The public, 
which received it with satisfaction, was entirely the gainer, though its usefulness 
was probably a good deal impaired by its detachment from the other parts, which 
in the present work illustrate and confirm it. — Fuaxcesco Paoli. 

2 Plato in the Dialogue entitled the Sophist : 6aa 8'av riov ixeydKcav 8ei SLanoueta-dai 
/caAto?, Trept rijov tolovt(x)i> SeBoKTai Tracrt /cat TraAai, to npoTepou if aixiKpol? /cat paocrtv 
avTo. 6etv /u.eAeTaj', nplf av iv avTol<i rotv /xeytaTots. (Page 218 C.)* 

9 



10 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ever, only the few, the exceptional minds, who thus know 
how to measure the importance of the trite maxims which 
guide the common sense of mankind, it happens that these 
primary truths, though perfectly well known, are seldom 
applied as the rule of tlwught and action, or are applied 
uncertainly and inefficiently. Having once been recognized, 
they are forthwith passed by, in the search for newer and 
more special rules, which are held to be more precious, pre- 
cisely because they are less obvious and are valued in pro- 
portion to their unfamiliarity. This explains why, in spite 
of the many centuries during which it has been known that 
the true method of teaching proceeds from the lesser to the 
greater, from that which is easy to that which is difficult, 
from the known to the unknown by insensible gradations ; 
yet to this day, in the full blaze of science, it is rare to 
find books intended for the instruction of the young, that 
faithfully follow this easy and natural order. It is equally 
rare to find teachers thus adapting their lessons to the minds 
of their pupils, and leading them, as it were by the hand, 
from the lower to the higher by a pleasant and gently in- 
clined ascent, until they reach the lofty regions of rarer 
atmosphere and perpetual light. Both in the text-books 
recommended by those who direct education, and in the 
lessons given, there is the same want of true method. Au- 
thors and teachers, satisfied with knowing the excellent rule 
we have pointed out, and recognizing its indisputable truth, 
set it aside at the very moment when in the process of teach- 
ing they should keep it most carefully in view, and. consult 
it in the construction of every sentence they write and 
speak, as an infallil)le oracle, however trite may l:>e its utter- 
ances. It is disdained by those who hold themselves far 
above the vulgar herd ; and hence, in their aml)itious pur- 
suit of science, they are apt to let go of common sense ; 
while the young, whom they should be guiding upwards. 



NEED OF SCIENTIFIC EXPOSITION. 11 

either stay idling nt the foot of the hill, or the nobler 
spirits among theni, pressing forward unguided, fall ex- 
hausted and shattered on the cliff i by the way. 

13. It is true that the application of a principle so sim- 
ple in itself is by no means simple. It requires much 
thought, and above all an inflexible purpose, to apply it to 
every, even the least, detail of teaching, so that not a sen- 
tence — nay, not even a word or sign — shall depart from this 
law of method ; and it is among the ablest minds that have 
written for the young that we find most zeal in such per- 
severing and ingenious application. But though, by their 
noble efforts to conform their teaching to their principle, 
they produce excellent results, and greatly advance their 
pupils, their art is lost for other writers and teachers, to 
whom they do not transmit the observations they have made, 
or the rules for its application which they have discovered 
by practice. It remains, therefore, still a desideratum, that 
some one should mark out the road which every teacher 
ought to follow in order to conform his lessons to the maxim 
quoted above from the Greek philosopher, and lead the 
tender minds of his pupils by easy and gentle gradations 
to the heights of knowledge. This is the work we propose 
to do, or, at least, attempt ; and, as the shortest way to 
it, we shall begin ])y addressing ourselves to the following 
problem : — 

What is the ruling principle of method? or, in other words, 
how shall we find the sure rule by which the teacher of 
youth shall know what things he must begin with, and 
what should follow, so that the child who hears him may 
be led on, by gradations always duly adapted to his powers, 
from what he knows to what he does not know and has yet 
to be taught? 



12 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 



CHAPTER I. 

ON THE GRADATIONS WHICH MUST BE OBSERVED IN THE 
MENTAL OPERATIONS REQUIRED OF CHILDREN. 

14. It is evident that, for this purpose, we must determine 
what is easy and what is difficult for children to understand, 
and that we require an accurate test of the various degrees 
of difficulty in the various parts of any subject of instruc- 
tion. Here we have to take into account the differences 
in quality and power of different minds, which vary in 
nothing so much as in their more or less quickness of appre- 
hension in passing from one idea to another. The slower 
minds are often left behind, not because the ideas them- 
selves are beyond their capacit}^, but because they move 
slowly ; and while they are still laboriously toiling over the 
first steps, the teacher, without waiting for them, passes on 
to the next and the next, so that they lose the connecting 
links, and are left like travellers on a long journey whose 
guide has hurried on out of their sight. Such minds are 
reckoned the weaker and inferior, but are so, really, only in so 
far as they are unable to follow the series of ideas with the 
average degree of quickness, and, having lost the thread 
of connection, they are brought to a stand for want of a 
In'idge, as it were, from one idea to the other. Hence also 
the erroneous opinion that there are subjects beyond certain 
intellectual capacities, whereas, in truth, those capacities fail 
to reach them, not from any inability to attain them if time 
were given to take each necessaiy step in due succession, 
but only because the road has been hidden or broken up. 

15. Everything, therefore, depends on determining what 
is the natural gradation of ideas ; how the mind passes from 
one to another ; which are those ideas that are connected 



DUE GRADATION OF OBJECTS. 13 

and stand, as it were, in immediate proximity ; which follow 
next on these, and so on to the most remote. 

It will be evident to all that we are now on the ground 
of idealogy, and that it is from that science we must seek 
the full and effectual solution of the proposed problem. 
I might begin by assuming that the reader is already 
acquainted with the principles of idealogy which I have 
already published, and to which this essay is an addition 
in the way of development and application. But, in order 
that those who do not possess this knowledge may be able 
to follow me, I will here and there point out the leading 
idealogical principles, and summarize what I have said 
in my previous works on the subject, wherever it may 
be useful to make the reasoning clear. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE GRADATION OF MENTAL OPERATIONS DEPENDS ON THE 
GRADATION QF OBJECTS TO WHICH THE ATTENTION OF 
CHILDREN IS DIRECTED. 

16. Let US then enter into the human mind, and see what 
is the invariable law of its progress, the natural scale of 
thought bv which it ascends. The law must hold o-ood for 
all intellects alike, because it is intrinsic to the human mind. 
The scale must be the same for all minds, great or small, 
without a single step being omitted by any, although some 
minds will go faster and some slower. 

17. In order to help ourselves towards the discover}^ of 
this law, let us start from any one thought with which our 
minds are occupied, and, reducing it to its elementary com- 
ponents, let us trace the thoughts which must have preceded 
(j,nd those which must follow it. We shall thus ascertain 
the place it holds in the intellectual scale, which step stands 
immediately below^ and which next aljove it. 



14 0^ THE BULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

18. Whatever the thought we select for examination, it 
must have an object ; l)ut neither is tlie object the thought, 
nor the thought the object. What theii is thouglit? It is 
tlie act by which the mind fixes its intellectual attention 
upon anything, say a flower, or carries it from one thing 
to another, — from the flower, a rose for instance, to its 
species or class ; thinking of it as a noisette, or China or 
damask rose, or as belonging to a larger species or class, 

— that of roses in general, or to the still larger family of the 
Rosace?e. What is the ol^ject of thought? It is the term of 
this act, the thing on which attention is fixed, — in the above 
case, first, a flower in general ; then the noisette, China or 
damask rose ; then roses in general ; and then the family 
of rosaceous plants. Who would say that these objects, which 
may be so various, are the acts of the mind? It would 
be as absurd as to say that the objects which pass before 
the eyes are the acts of the e^^es immovably looking at 
them. It is, therefore, certain that every thought is the 
result of two distinct factors, — i. e. the act of the mind that 
thinks (in which lies, properly speaking, the nature of 
thought), and the objects of which it thinks, and which 
are the given conditions of thought ; for without objects 
the mind cannot think. 

19. Now the act of the mind is always an act of the 
intellectual attention fixed on some object or another ; but 
the objects may vary indefinitely. If, therefore, there is 
a fixed law whereby the mind passes from one object of its 
thought to another, that law must be found in the objects, 

— in the manner, that is, in which they present themselves 
successively to the mind. 



HOW OBJECTS ARE PRESENTED TO THE MIND. 15 



CHAPTER III. 

ON THE NATURAL ORDER IN WHICH OBJECTS PRESENT THEM- 
SELVES TO THE HUMAN MIND, FIRST DISCERNED IN CLAS- 
SIFICATION. 

20. Let US, then, inquire how objects present themselves- 
to the mind, which come first and which follow, and this 
will lead us to the natural and necessary order of thought 
we are in search of. 

21. If I see a yellow- white rose, I cannot classify it 
among the flowering plants, unless I have first distin- 
guished flowering plants from all others. The thought, 
therefore, by which I classify the rose among flowering- 
plants could not arise in my mind except on condition that 
I had first had another thought, — nameh^, that by which I 
separated, in my mind, flowers from all other forms of vege- 
tation. If, moreover, I say to myself, This flower belongs 
to the family of the Rosacea^, I prove that, besides having 
distinguished flowering plants from all other plants, I have 
also distinguished the Rosacese among flowering plants in 
general. This new thought, then, presupposes not one 
thought alone, but at least two, — the two distinsuishina: 
thoughts, by one of which I separate flowers from other 
forms of vegetation, and by the other the Rosacese from 
other flowers. Unless my mind had already held these two 
thoughts, it would be unable to arrive at the third, and could 
never pronounce the sentence, "This flower belongs to the 
family of the Rosacese." 

But, if I go on to distinguish roses among the Rosaceae, 
it is evident that I must previously have had three thoughts 
at least; since I could not distinguish roses among the 
Rosacese if I had not first distinguished the Rosacea from 
other flowering plants, and flqwering from all other plants. 
By parity of reasoning, we shall find that I cannot affirm 



16 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

to myself, "This is a China rose," unless I make one more 
distinction which supposes all the preceding ones ; nor can 
I finally perceive that the rose I see belongs to the kind 
named by gardeners Adelaide of Como, unless I make two 
more distinctions in addition to those that went before. 

22. Be it noted that I am speaking of distinct thought, 
and not of the mere acceptance of a name without knowl- 
edge of the thing named ; for assuredly it is possible for 
me to know that the white object I see is called Adelaide 
of Como, without knowing that it is a China rose, or that 
it is a rose at all, or that it is one of the Rosacese, or 
a flower, or a plant. On the contrary, I cannot affirm, with 
clear understanding of what I am afllirming, that this thing 
which delights my eyes is an Adelaide of Como, without 
knowing, first of all, that it is a flowering plant, of the 
family of the Rosacea?, and properly a China rose, and, 
moreover, that kind among China roses to which gardeners 
have been pleased to give that name ; for all this is signified 
by the words "Adelaide of Como" as designating the object. 

CHAPTER IV. 

CONTINUATION. — METHOD OF TEACHING CHILDREN THE CLAS- 
SIFICATION OF THINGS. 

23. Now, let us bring a little child into the garden with 
the intention of teaching him all that we have mentioned 
above, and place him before the Adelaide rose. How shall 
I begin my lesson, supposing him to be of very tender age, 
and never to have been in a garden before, nor to have seen 
either plants or flowers ? 

There are three ways in which I can lead him to make 
all the distinctions above indicated : — 

(1.) I can begin ])y telling him the name of the rose he 
sees, and then take him on from the individual to the 



CLASSIFICATION OF OBJECTS. 17 

species or smaller class, next to the larger and yet larger 
classes, until I bring him to the knowledge of the genera of 
plants. 

(2.) I can take the contrary way, making him, that is, 
first distinguish the rose he sees as a plant, and then from 
the genus lead him to the species or larger class, and so down 
to the smaller classes, until finally I make him observe the 
individuality of that particular plant. 

(3.) Lastly, I can, without attending to any gradations 
or order, speak to the child of roses, of plants and the other 
classifications, just as they come, without thought, to my 
lips. 

24. It is evident that this last method is the worst, or 
rather it is the negation of all method. The child would 
be constrained to jump in thought now from the smaller 
to the larger class, now from the larger to the smaller ; 
while as ^-et he knows nothing of classes, and still less 
of the signs by which he could recognize the respective 
extent of the classes. 

25. As regards the other two methods, let us compare 
them, first with the view simply to observe the different 
operations of the child's mind in following the lesson we 
are giving him, and secondly to find out which of the two 
methods and corresix)nding series of mental operations is 
the easier, the most convenient to him. 

26. If I want to lead him from the individual to the 
general, I shall tell him first that the beautiful object he 
sees is called Adelaide of Como; then I shall tell him that 
it is a China rose, then that it is a rose, then one of the 
Rosacese, then that it is a flowering plant, and lastly a 
plant. If I want instead to lead him from the general 
to the individual, I shall begin by telling him that the 
individual object is a plant, then that it is a flowering 
plant, then one of the Rosaceae, then a rose, then a China 



18 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

rose, and at last that it is an Adelaide of Como. In passing 
through the first series of ideas the child's mind is com- 
pelled to fix its attention first on the differences of things 
and then on their resemblances ; for the individual is indi- 
A'idual only in virtue of its unlikeness to all others, and the 
individual of a special class is an individual of that class 
only in virtue of its unlikeness to the other special classes 
which make up the genus. From the differences he then 
passes to the resemblances, — first, to those common to the 
smaller number, then to those common to a larger number. 
For he cannot rise from the individual objects called Ade- 
laide roses to the conception of the objects called China 
roses, unless he observes — 1. That there are resemblances 
in several of these objects, so that all alike are named 
Adelaide roses ; 2. That there are other resemblances 
belonging not only to these first objects, but to many 
others, which hence are named all together China roses. 
In order to rise to the conception of the rose in general, 
he must observe a third series of such resemblances common 
to a much larger number of objects, on which rests this 
third and wider classification. A fourth series of observa- 
tion will be required to lead him to the conception of the 
Rosacese as distinguished from the preceding conception ; 
a fifth, to take him on to that of flowering plants ; and, 
finally, a sixth, in order that he may arrive at the wider 
conception, that to which we want to lead him, — the con- 
ception of plants in general. 

27. In passing through the second series of ideas, which 
is the inversion of the first, the mind of the child is obliged 
to fix attention first on the resemblances instead of the dif- 
ferences of objects ; and he has to consider the former as the 
limits of the latter, passing step by step from the wider 
range of resemblances to the narrower. Thus he learns, 
first, the widest range of resemblances which form the 



PRESENTATION OF OBJECTS. 19 

genus, and then the differences which more and more 
restrict and break up the genus into narrower and nar- 
rower classes. Having recognized the widest resemblances 
which constitute the class of plants in general, he must next 
learn the limit of those resemblances, — nameW, the differ- 
ences which mark out flowering plants from all others ; 
then, among those flowering plants, he must distinguish 
the dift'erences that mark the class of Rosacese ; then 
those which among the Rosacese mark the minor class of 
roses ; then the differences between China and other roses ; 
and, finalh^, the ultimate difference between the Adelaide 
of Como and all other China roses. 

28. These, then, are the tw^o series of operations through 
which the child must pass. Which of these will he find the 
easier to follow ? Will it be less difficult for him to find out 
the differences than the resemblances of things? Is the 
mental operation, by which we discern that two or more 
things are alike, more simple or more complicated than 
that by which we discern that they are unlike? That is 
the question. 

To find the answer, w^e must go on studying the two 
modes of operation in the child's mind, and ascertain, by 
an accurate analysis, which of the two is the more simple 
or complicated. 

29. If I tell the child, whom I suppose to be at the earli- 
est stage of mental development, that the beautiful object 
he sees is named Adelaide of Como, he will certainly be 
unable to affix to that name the meaning attached to it by 
gardeners, who express by it one of the latest and most 
restricted classes of the rose. To the child, therefore, 
this denomination can be only a proper name, arbitrarily 
affixed to that object ; he simply associates the sensation 
caused by the sight of the object with the sensation caused 
by the sound that reaches his ears. But, when I go on with 



20 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

my lesson and tell him in addition that there are many 
Adelaide roses, and show them to him in tlie garden, he 
is obliged to change the meaning he had first attributed 
to the word, — to go back on the act of the mind by which 
he took the name for the sign of the one individual he saw, 
and to substitute for it another by which he decides that 
Adelaide of Como is not a proper name, but a name com- 
mon to many similar objects. 

30. If I then show him another rose, named Sappho, it is 
probable that he will call it an Adelaide of Como, because, 
however different its color, its form is similar. I shall teach 
him to distinguish it by pointing out the bright-purple color 
of the one to which I give the name of Sapplio, compared 
with the yellow- white of the former. I shall also teach him 
that the word Sapplio does not designate a single object, but 
a class of similar objects, showing him many Sapphos in the 
garden, with the result as before, that, having first taken 
Sappho to be the name of an individual, he will correct this 
first impression, and accept it as the name of a class of 
things. 

31. Moreover, before going further, he will have to cor- 
rect a third erroneous impression. For, at first, before 
I had shown him the Sappho, he knew only the Adelaide, 
and thought there was no other class ; so, that when he 
saw the Sappho he at once applied to it the name Adelaide. 
But afterwards, on hearing that its name was Sappho, not 
Adelaide, he perceived his mistake, and restricted the class 
Adelaide within limits which he had first overpassed. 

32. We come now to the third step, and I shall try 
to make him understand that both Adelaides and Sapphos 
have a name common to both, i. e. China roses. In order to 
understand this, the child will have to perform several men- 
tal operations, which are these : — 

First, he will have to recognize that the Adelaides and 



PRESENTATION OF OBJECTS. 21 

Sapplios, which he had at the outset distinguished by such 
wholly different names, have certain features in common 
which make them susceptible of receiving a common name. 
This is as much as to say that he will have to correct and 
change for the fourth time the meaning he had mentally 
given to the two words Adelaide and Sappho. For, as 
before, seeing the Sappho, he believed that there was no 
other class than the Adelaides, and consequently placed 
in it the purple rose also ; so, having learnt to give the 
latter a wholly different name, he separated entirely the 
Adelaide from the Sappho, without attending at all to what 
they might have in common. But now, when I teach him 
the common name of China roses, I make him reflect that 
the words Adelaide and Sappho are not used to signify those 
objects absolutely, but only to signify that in each by which 
it is distinguished from the other, and that there is another 
name, common to both, that of China roses, which is used 
to signify that in which they are alike. 

33. I will now lead him on to know a yet wider class 
of these lovely objects than that of China roses, — i. e. the 
class of roses in general. For this purpose, I must, follow- 
ing the same course as before, make him recognize, as in the 
case of the two varieties of China roses, the Adelaide and 
Sappho, two other varieties, say the damask rose, that, for 
example, called by gardeners Admirahle^ with white petals 
edged with crimson, and the red variety they call Graciosa. 
From these two varieties I shall lead my pupil to the species 
damask rose. But throughout this process he will again 
(as when I brought him to know the China rose) receive 
facts, and then have to correct in turn four erroneous 
impressions ; and to these will be added a fifth, namely, the 
following : — 

When, after showing my little pupil the Admirable and 
the Graciosa, I ask him what name will be common to them 



22 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

both, he will immediately answer, "China roses," because as 
yet he knows no other species, and believes the Adelaide 
and Sappho, Admirable and Graciosa, to be four varieties of 
the same class. I help him to correct this error by telling 
him that the two latter varieties are not China but damask 
roses, and by making him observe the peculiarities which 
distino-uish the China from the damask rose. 

Arrived at this stage, I can also make him observe that 
both the China and the damask sort are alike roses, thus 
raising his mind to the conception of a larger class, includ- 
ing the damask as well as China species. 

34. But the infant mind of my little pupil could not 
attain to this larger conception without first correcting 
a new error regarding the meaning of the names China 
and damask roses, — names which, in the first instance, 
serve to indicate those two varieties as altogether different, 
and having nothing in common. He attends to their resem- 
blances only when he is told that they have a common name, 
that of roses. ^ 

35. I now go on and show my pupil a white thorn in 
flower in the garden, and a medlar also in flower. He will 
at once take these flowers for roses ; but I shall tell him he 
is mistaken, and that the flowers he sees are not roses, but 
belong to the Rosacese. Poor child ! Once more he will have 
to reform the conception he had formed of roses, — that is, he 
must restrict the meaning he had given to the word "rose," 
and learn to understand that not all the flowers which resem- 
ble a rose are roses. Then, prompted by the word "Rosa- 
ce?e" which he hears from me, he will fix his attention on 
that which distinguishes the roses already known to him and 
the Rosacese I am now showing him. Thus, for the tenth 
time, he will have to correct a mental error : but he is still 

1 The child's mind is assisted at this stage by the names themselves, China, 
j'Ose and daxmisk rose, in which there is the word " rose " common to both. 



MENTAL ERKORS INDUCED. 23 

ignorant of the true meaning of the word Rosaceae, — igno- 
rant that it designates a hirger ckiss of tilings, in which 
roses are included ; ignorant, tlierefore, that, while all roses 
are Rosaceae, not all the Rosaceae are roses. 

36. I must therefore go back again, and, beginning with 
the individual white thorn he has seen, make him understand 
that that name indicates not only the individual before him, 
but a whole species divided into many varieties ; and that 
he must, as before, make a fourfold correction in his mind 
as to the meaning of the word. Then I must go through 
the same process in connection with the flower of the med- 
lar ; first causing the child to fall into, and then helping him 
out of, five more mistakes. Finally, I must lead him to 
compare the flower of the thorn with that of the medlar, 
and, after making him perceive their differences, malve him 
observe their resemblances and the resemblances which they 
have also with 7'oses, so that he shall arrive at last at under- 
standing that the thorn and the medlar and the rose are 
three classes of the Rosaceae. But in passing through these 
successive steps he falls into and has to correct two more 
errors, one of which consists in taking the white thorn for 
a medlar or for a rose ; the second, in taking the names 
"white thorn" and "medlar" as absolute, and not merely 
signifying objects in some respects unlike, but having 
besides a name Rosaceae, common to roses, to thorns 
and to medlars, signifying some properties common to all. 
Only then does he begin to understand the meaning of the 
word "Rosaceae." 

37. Up to this point the child thus led on has fallen into 
at least twenty-two mental errors, which he has had as often 
to correct. Let us go on. I must now teach him to dis- 
tinguish the Rosaceae from other flowers. If I show him 
a lily or a jessamine and ask him what it is, he will probably 
answer that it is a Rosacea, for as yet he knows no wider 



24 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

class. I must, therefore, tell him that the flower he is look- 
ing at is not a Rosacea, but a lily or jessamine. Having 
learnt this, he must restrict the meaning of the word 
".Rosacese," which before had signified to him the general 
class of all the objects he saw in the garden, and apply 
it only to a special class among them. Thus he commits 
and then corrects a mistake about the word " Rosacese," 
being the twenty- third. 

38. But, if I want to make him understand that the words 
"lily" and "jessamine" do not indicate only the individuals 
I am showing him, but families, such as the Rosacete, divided 
again into classes and species, and the latter into varieties, 
I must take him by the same road, full of successive pit- 
falls out of which he has to extricate himself, as when I led 
him to understand the meaning of the Rosacete. Unless 
I do this, I cannot bring him to the clear conception of 
flowering plants, which is my object, — a wider conception 
than that of the families, species, and varieties of the 
flowers which I have hitherto shown him. Not to trouble 
the reader with tedious repetitions, I will suppose this 
process gone through, and will simply obserA^e that, in the 
course of it, my pupil has repeated his previous twenty-two 
mistakes, at least, for each family I make him acquainted 
with ; so that, summing up all the errors his mind passes 
through to arrive at the knowledge of the three families 
of the Rosacea, the lilies, and the jessamine, we shall find 
that tlioy come to about sixty-seven. 

39. When further I tell him that the Rosacese, the lilies, 
and the jessamine are all alike flowers,, I correct three more 
errors his mind had fallen into in supposing in turn that the 
words " Rosacese," " lilies," " jessamine," signified the 
largest class or genera, while now he finds that the}^ signify 
classes subordinate to the genus or class of floivers^ which 
leads his mind to attend to the signs common to the three 
families known to him, which before he had not perceived. 



ERRORS INDUCED — CONTINUED. 25 

40. My pupil having arrived at this degree of knowledge, 
I take him into the kitchen-garden and show him a line 
peach-tree crimson with ripe peaches. If I ask him its 
name, he will tell me it is a Jiower, for he knows no other 
class nnder which he could place it. "No," I reply, "it is 
not a flower, hut a fruit," and so oblige him to correct the 
meaning he attaches to words for the seventy-first time, by 
making him understand that the class of flowers does not 
include all he sees in the garden. And yet he is still far 
from understanding the meaning of fniit as used in ordinary 
parlance, since it is used to signify neither an individual 
nor a variety, nor a smaller or larger class, but a class 
sufficiently extensive to include under it other classes of 
varying extent. I must, therefore, make him understand 
that there are many kinds of fruit, such as those formed 
around a hard stone ; others hanging in clusters, like grapes 
or Ijerries ; others like seeds ; others that grow in ears, as 
wheat or Indian corn ; others that are altogether pulpy, 
and so on : further, that the fruit he is looking at is a stone- 
fruit, but that it is only one of many species called peach 
or cherry or olive, etc. ; that this one is a peach, but that 
there are several sorts of peaches, such as the hard-fleshed 
and the soft-fleshed, etc. ; and that the one in question is 
hard-fleshed, Ijut that there are several other similar sorts. 
Now, to teach him all this in inverse order, — i. e. begin- 
ning with the individual peach he sees, and taking him from 
the particular sort of peach to peaches in general, then to 
stone-fruits, and then to fruits in general, it is evident that 
I must lead his mind to form seventy-one more erroneous 
conceptions in the first instance, which, afterwards, I shall 
have to make him, an equal number of times, change and 
rectify. 

41. Finally, having thus brought him to know fruit as 
a large class of the objects he sees in the garden, distinct 



26 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

from that other large class of flowers which he first learnt 
to know, I may take him on to the conception of plants 
in general, leading him to place under this new and larger 
classification both flowering and fruit-bearing plants as 
subordinate classes ; and this he will do, on condition, 
however, of again correcting the meaning he had attached 
to the two words flowering plant and fruit-bearing plant, 
restricting them, from their first signification in his mind 
as complete and independent classes before he knew that 
of plants in general, to that of subordinate classes of the 
latter. 

42. Such is the lengthy road by which the child arrives 
at some clear conception of the words x>lant and vegetable. 
Is this the right method? Is this the easiest and quickest 
road to knowledge ? To answer this question, we must com- 
pare the method followed with the other and inverse one, — 
that which leads from the general to the less general ; but 
first, I must make two observations, to justify and explain 
what I have hitherto said. 

43. The first is that, in the case I have supposed of the 
child taking the first class he learns to distinguish as the 
most extensive, and then finding out his mistake by learn- 
ing that there are still wider classes of things, is not a 
fanciful one, but a fact which I have learnt from experi- 
ments made with children, whose intellectual development 
always begins with learning the two extremities of human 
knowledge, — i. e. the individual hy perception, and then the 
most universal, the class, if so it may be called, of things, 
of existences. From this universal class of things in gen- 
eral they come down to the conception of smaller classes, 
although always inclined to make each as large as possible, 
and only gradually arriving at the smallest.^ 

1 See the observations I have made on a little girl, two years and a half old, in 
the " Ei7mova)nento delta Filosqfia,'' B. II. CXXXI. 



COMPARISON OF METHODS. 27 

44. My second observation is this, that all the errors, 
which I have shown the child's mind to pass through, have 
their principal source in the meaning he attaches to the 
words he hears ; and, for this reason, that it is by the use 
of words that he classifies the objects he sees, the word 
beino- the sion associated in his mind with certain common 
properties which are the foundation of his classification.^ 

45. Coming now to the comparison of the two methods, 
let us first l)ear in mind that it is a fact of experience 
admitted by philosophers, even of the most opposite schools, 
that the human being; is more inclined to observe the resem- 
blances of things than their differences ; that he discovers 
the former before the latter ; ^ and that the child proceeds, 
from believing things to be alike, to observe later how far 
they are unlike. I have explained this indisputable fact 
in my writings on Idealogy.^ 

46. This being established, it follows that the method 
most in conformity with the nature of the human mind, and 
the spontaneous action of infant intelligence, is that which 
leads it by the way of resemblances and not of differ- 
ences, — which begins by calling the attention of the child, 
througii the use of names to the more general resemblances 
of things, leading him later on to note the less general ; in 
other words, bringing him by degrees to limit these more 
general resemblances by the differences he is made to per- 
ceive in things which yet have this general likeness. 

47. Now, the method which leads the child from the gen- 

1 These common properties, considered apart from each individual and as the 
ground of classification, are so many abstractions made by the mind in using 
words. AVe have elsewhere demonstrated that the mind would never arrive at 
making tliese abstr[iction8 but for the impulse given to it by language. See 
"New Essay on the Origin of Ideas, Nos. 514 sqq. 

2 "Young children fliul relations of similarity in the most dissimilar things; all 
children are coachmen, their sticks are horses, the chairs coaches." — Taverna, 
Novelle Morali (Moral Tales), Preliminary Discourse. 

3 See the two chapters XXXII. and XXXIII. of B. II. of the work entitled 
Rinnovamento della FUosofia in Italia (Revival of Philosophy in Italy). 



28 ON THE EULING PIIINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

eral to the particular is precisely that which draws his 
attention first to the widest resemblances, and afterwards 
to the differences as limits of these same resemblances ; 
whereas the method which leads the child from the particu- 
lar to the general does exactly the reverse, — i. e. leads him 
to consider first the widest differences and afterwards the 
lesser differences, introducing the resemblances as limits to 
the differences. 

48. Hence the former is manifestly the method which 
follows nature, and the latter that which opposes and con- 
tradicts it. 

And, in fact, if I teach the child that all the individuals 
he sees in the garden are called pZanifs, and he hears me 
repeat the name plant at every successive individual I point 
out to him, he will, with the greatest ease, arrive at that 
degree of classification ; for it demands from him no atten- 
tion to particular differences, but only that he should form 
in his mind the general image of one of the individuals 
shown to him. This he does by putting together in the 
rough, as it were, the appearances common to all plants, 
and, having this picture in his mind in broad outline, it only 
remains for him to correct and fill it in in various ways, 
which he does by successive degrees. 

49. Hence, when I go on to show him the difference 
between the plants which are merely for pleasure and 
ornament, the flowers and the fruit-bearing plants, he has 
only to take up his mental sketch and to give it two more 
touches, if I may so express it, by which he brings out the 
type or conception of flowering plants on the one hand, and 
that of fruit-bearing plants on the other. In doing this he 
is not called upon to correct his first outline as erroneous, 
for it remains permanently true and useful to him as knowl- 
edge of plants in general. He has only to add to it the 
more finished designs of special flowering or fruit-bearing 



ORDER IN LOCAL CLASSIFICATION". 29 

plants. The same holds good for all the further classifica- 
tions the child's mind forms by this method, down to the 
more special ones of rosaceous plants, and those of different 
kinds of fruit, and, among the Rosaceae, those that bear 
China roses ; and among the peaches, those that are hard- 
fleshed ; and so on to the Adelaide of Como rose, and to 
special varieties of peaches, etc. Throughout this series of 
efforts, the child is continually forming more and more dis- 
tinct conceptions without committing a single error regard- 
ing the extent of the class, or the meaning of the terms he 
has learnt to use. All the conceptions he has successively 
formed are accurate ; and the work done need neither be- 
altered nor undone, but is well graduated and put together 
and ready for future use.^ 

50. It is evident, then, that the true and natural method, 
by which children should be taught the classification of 
things, is that which begins by showing and naming to them 
the most general class, and the various individuals belonging 
to it; and thence, little by little, goes on to smaller and 
smaller classes and to the individuals falling under them, 
until we reach the smallest of all, that which I have termed 
the full species.'^ 

CHAPTER V. 

CONTINUATION. — ORDER IN WHICH OBJECTS PRESENT THEM- 
SELVES TO THE HUMAN MIND IN THE LOCAL DISTRIBUTION 
OF THINGS. 

51. We have now arrived at a knowledge of the steps 
by which the human mind proceeds in the classification of 
objects ; but what we are seeking is something more uni- 

1 See Paradiso, canto xxix. vv. 130-132. 

" This nature so doth graduate itself 
In numbers, that there never hath been speech 
Nor mortal concept that can go so far." 

2 It is of importance to bear in mind here what I have said in the '* New Essay," 
Nos. 647 sqq., relating to species and genera. 



30 ON THE EULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

versal tliau this. We want not only to know how the mind 
succeeds in classifying the objects of its knowledge, but the 
general law of its graduated action in every form of thought, 
so as to obtain from it a general rule to guide us in leading 
the child to knowledge. 

52. What we have akeady said about classification pre- 
pares the way for us, however, to find the general order 
followed by the mind in other operations. There is no 
surer way to this than observation of its processes as re- 
gards the particular things about which it is active, and the 
reduction of them afterwards to a general formula. Let us 
then return again for a little while to the careful observation 
of what passes in the child's mind. 

We have seen that the action of the mind in classification 
consists in finding the relations of resemblance and differ- 
ence existing between things. Let us now examine how the 
infant mind discovers other relations ; those, for example, 
of respective localities. 

53. Our pupil, whom we will call Felix, has already been 
shown all the plants in the garden, and has l)een taught 
how to classify them according to the above method, so 
that he can distinguish each tree, each shrub, each herb, 
each flower, and give to them without difficulty their more 
or less general, or more or less specific, names. 

But the garden where he has learned all this is ill- 
arranged ; the families and genera of plants are all mixed 
up together. Felix would like to have his garden divided 
into three separate plots, — one for the ornamental plants, 
one for the fruit and vegetables, and one for the medicinal 
plants ; and that in each division the sub-divisions, proper 
to the plants themselves, should be observed. Let us sup- 
pose that one day he mentions this wish to his teacher, 
and that the latter, pleased with his pupil's thought, should 
obtain as a reward from the father of the child a small piece 



CONDITIOK OF LOCAL CLASSIFICATION. 31 

of ground where tlie latter can make a garden after his own 
devices. 

54. What was the necessary condition of snch a thought 
entering the child's mind as that of arranging a garden 
according to the classification of plants which he has learnt? 
Clearly that he should first have learnt the classification, 
just as the condition of his learning the classification was 
that he should first learn to know the individuals to be 
classified. Here we see that a certain thought is the neces- 
sary condition of another thought, which follows the first 
and cannot precede it. In the case we are considering, the 
thought of the individuals preceded that of the resem- 
blances between them ; the thought of the resemblances 
preceded that of classes ; the thought of the classes pre- 
ceded that of the local arrangement of the objects classi- 
fied. This order in the objects of thought is necessary, 
and is followed by all minds alike, whatever their degree 
of intelligence. 

55. How then could we teach a child the propriety ^of 
a certain local distribution of objects according to their 
classes, if we had not first taught him to know the classes 
themselves ? These once known, the thought of their local 
distribution comes spontaneously into his mind, and he 
understands it as soon as it is proposed to him. Here we 
have the order of thought respecting the local distribution 
of objects, and at the same time a rule of method in teach- 
ing suggested by Nature herself, — first, show the child the 
basis, the reason for a given distribution of objects, and 
he will immediately, with scarcely any assistance, under- 
stand the distribution. The thought of it will occur to 
him spontaneously ; he will feel its propriety and see how 
it can be effected. 

56. Again, let us suppose that Felix has set to work to 
make his garden after his own fashion, and arranged it 



32 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

according to the classification of plants which he has learnt. 
When he has nearly finished it, he finds out that he has 
allotted too niiicli space to the divisions of medicinal and 
flowering plants, and left too little for the fruit and vegeta- 
bles, which brings him to the conclusion that the ground 
should be divided in more exact proportion to the number 
and size of the plants of each kind. This is a new reflec- 
tion, a new cognition he has arrived at by experience. 

57. Was it possible for him to arrive at it sooner? Cer- 
tainly there would be no absurdity in supposing that, before 
transporting the plants into his garden, he had considered 
that he must divide the ground according to their number 
and size. But, even if he had taken all this into considera- 
tion before setting to work, and before he had learnt the 
necessity of it from experience, still it would remain true 
that the order in which the thoughts occurred to his mind 
was and must be the following : — 

(1) The reflection, as yet only general, that the plants 
must be placed in different plots of ground according to the 
classes to which they belong. 

(2) The reflection on the mode of distributing the plants 
properly according to their classes. 

58. Here we find the law pointed out in the last chapter, 
i. e. that the mind first conceives the general and then the 
particular, — first the thought blocked out, as it were, in the 
rough, then in definite outline, then finished and perfected ; 
first the necessity for a division, then the form to be given 
to it. 

59. As regards this mode or form, a multitude of reflec- 
tions will be successively awakened in the child's mind by 
experience, which no foresight, however keen, could have 
supplied, teaching him now the necessity of so arranging 
the plants that the taller and more leafy shall not over- 
shadow the smaller and slighter ; now, that certain plants 



LOCAL DISTRIBUTION OF OBJECTS. 33 

require more shelter than others from cold or wind, from 
damp or drought ; that certain others must be put into poor, 
others into rich, otliers into sandy soil; others again into 
stiff soil, or in woody or marshy situations. He further 
learns that plants have their seasons, so that his plots 
remain at times bare, and shorn of their beauty ; and that, 
as he cannot have all the plants in every season, he had bet- 
ter replace spring by summer plants, and these by autumnal 
ones. Thus by slow degrees, and by the continual suc- 
cession of new thoughts, he learns that the proper distribu- 
tion of plants in his little garden is by no means such an 
easy thing as he imagined at first, but is, instead, a slowly 
acquired art, requiring a long apprenticeship of labor, experi- 
ment, and thought. 

60. Who does not see that this progress in his mind is 
made by successive degrees ; that his reflections follow a 
certain order, connecting each with each, the one beiug 
derived from the other, so that the latter could not exist 
unless the former had preceded it? It is true that the 
teacher, enriched by his own experience, can communicate 
what he knows to his pupil ; but the teacher himself will, if 
he is wise, make himself the interpreter and disciple of 
Nature, and lead the child's mind to the knowledge of truth 
by the same gradual steps he would have to follow in gain- 
ing the knowledge for himself by the much longer road of 
experience. 

61. Let us examine another progress made by the mind 
with regard to the local distribution of objects. 

One line morning, Felix, going as usual into his garden 
and finding it carpeted with lovely flowers of every kind, 
thinks he will gather some, and tie them up into a nosegay 
for his mother. From that time, he takes to her every morn- 
ing his pretty gifts. He finds out for himself how to weave 
his flowers into garlands, and he soon perceives that some 



34 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

forms and colors go better together than others. As he 
takes great delight in this way of arranging his flowers 
according to their qualities, he soon learns how to make 
graceful and beautiful nosegays and garlands. 

62. It is easy to see that his mind follows in this progress 
a certain necessary course. For, in the first place, he could 
not reflect on the beauty of flowers unless the flowers were 
already known to him ; second, he could not think of tying 
them up into a nosegay unless he already knew not only 
one, but many flowers ; third, he could not think that they 
would give pleasure to his mother unless he had first thought 
of the beauty of the flowers, of his mother, and of giving 
her pleasure ; fourth, he could not think of the beauty of 
wreaths of flowers, involving a more complicated operation, 
unless he had at first gone through the simple operation of 
tjdng them together in a nosegay ; fifth, he could not think 
of arranging them so as to produce a more pleasing effect 
without having first observed that harmony of color and 
form produced such an effect ; sixth, he could not arrive 
at producing the most beautiful arrangement without first 
making many trials, mixing and weaving them together in 
various ways. 

CHAPTER VI. 

ON THE NATURAL ORDER IN WHICH OBJECTS ARE PRESENTED 
TO THE MIND IN ABSTRACT REASONING. 

63. The attempt to make the mind proceed by any other 
course than that indicated above would do it violence, 
and, far from assisting its development, would oppose and 
retard it. 

64. Another example will make clearer still the truth we 
want to establish, — i. e. that the human mind follows in its 
development a method prescribed by Nature, and that it 
must proceed by that method and no other ; for, even, if the 



METHOD PRESCRIBED BY NATURE. 35 

inexperienced teacher should fancy he had succeeded in 
carrying on his pupil's mind ]jy some road not natural to it, 
he would simply be misled by the fact that the child often 
undoes, by his own mental effort, the work presented to him 
by his teacher, and, as a rule, disentangles and rearranges 
for himself the confused mass of matter thrust into his 
memory, though at the cost of infinite trouble and annoy- 
ance. The labor thus imposed on children by teaching them 
things in the wrong order, which they have to set right for 
themselves before they can understand what is taught, not 
only makes their learning very slow, but also very arduous 
and wearisome, as being opposed to the natural laws of their 
intelligence. 

65. Who is so ignorant of logic as not to know that 
a process of reasoning is a series of propositions express- 
ing so many judgments, so many thoughts, so many cogni- 
tions, depending the one upon the other, as consequences 
from their principles? It follows that the mind cannot 
arrive at a given proposition without having first passed 
through all the preceding propositions of which it is the 
consequence. 

Take any theorem of Euclid, and you will find that its 
demonstration is reached by constant reference to preceding 
theorems which contain within them, as it were, the theorem 
that has to ])e demonstrated. Could the mind comprehend 
the ultimate theorem if it jumped over all the antecedent 
ones? The impossibility of this is evident. 

66. And here I would point out the reason why the 
method of mathematicians is accepted as the best. The 
excellence of this method consists solely in the right order 
in which the various propositions of which geometry con- 
sists are arranged ; and why should not the same rigorous 
order be observed in education as in any other science, or 
rather ought it not to be so observed? 



36 ON THE RULING PKINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Let US now seek the reason why mathematicians all 
observe this rigorous method required by the nature of the 
understanding, while the followers of other sciences neglect 
it, and in so far depart from the true and natural procedure 
of the intellect. 

G7. In mathematics, the mind is constrained to deduce 
one thing from another, which would he impossible unless it 
l)egan with the premises and deduced each proposition from 
the preceding one. Otherwise it would soon perceive that 
it was really doing nothing and understanding nothing, and 
would refuse to go on blindly groping in the dark. In other 
branches of knowledge, on the contrary, the mind fancies 
that it understands where it does not, and adopts the first 
proposition advanced, attaching to it some meaning of its 
own, and storing it away in the memory as an acquired fact ; 
and so on with all others. It is deceived as to the fact both 
by memory and language, as we have seen in the case of the 
child taught the classification of plants by passing from the 
lower to the higher, and at each step believing that he had 
learnt the name denoting a class, to find that he had made 
a mistake which had to be corrected. He does correct it, 
it is true, but at what a cost of wasted time ! Nor does the 
correction always follow so quickly. More often it happens 
that a man advanced in life finds accumulated in his memory, 
Avithout order or connection, a number of propositions which 
he learnt in youth, and which, though devoid of any living- 
meaning to him, are associated in his mind with words, to 
each of which he gives a certain value. If, by chance, his 
memory of them is revived, he l)egins to perceive their con- 
nection, and how the one explains the other, and thus to 
understand them, because he has himself arranged them in 
their natural order. He does this little by little as years 
go on, and this is the principal reason why intelligence and 
love of knowledge come only in later years. The method of 



ERRONEOUS METHOD PURSUED. 37 

education hitherto pursued aims only at cramming the child's 
memory with an innnensc Inu'den of unintelligiljlc words. 
The poor little brain is every day stamped and written over 
with mysterious signs and figures, not one of which can ])e 
understood till the whole has been gone through, seeing that 
the proposition, which is the key to all the rest and to itself, 
comes last instead of first of all, as it should do. Nothing 
of this kind can happen in mathematics, which never teach 
a proposition without -giving its reason and demonstrat- 
ing it. 

The teacher who should make it a rule to give his pupils 
in every case the demonstration of what he tells them would 
find himself obliged, like the mathematician, to follow a 
strict order in the arrangement of his matter, and to proceed 
by an equally rigorous method. 

CHAPTER VII. 

RECAPITULATION. 

68. It is time that we should sum up what we have said 
about the natural order of mental processes and their ob- 
jects. 

69. We have noted three kinds of objects about which 
the mind is occupied, and three modes of its action in re- 
spect to them: — the classification of objects by their resem- 
blances ; their distribution in a certain local order ; finally, 
abstract reasoning. 

70. In the first of these modes we have seen that, if the 
mind does not proceed by its natural method, it indeed 
gains something, but at the cost of continual mistakes 
which it has continually to correct. 

71. In the second, if the mind, limited as it is, be forced 
on against its natural method, it acquires something, but 
that something is confused and inaccurate ; its ideas become 



38 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

involved, and fail to attain any solid convictions as the basis 
of steady action. 

72. Finally, in the third, the mind cannot depart wholly 
from its natural order of progress, and any attempt to force 
it would be useless ; the result being simply that it would 
come altogether to a stand-still, and could learn nothing 
at all. 

To. These are precisely the three principal evils which 
follow from teaching the 3'Oung without observing the true 
method which preserves the progressive order of ideas, and 
of which we are seeking the principles : first, the mind is 
led into error ; secondly, its ideas are dim and confused ; 
thirdly, it is brought to a stand, and all but stupefied. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

NATURAL AND NECESSARY ORDER OF INTELLECTUAL ACTION. 

74. Now, if we consider attentively in what consists the 
natural and necessary order of the mental objects noticed 
in the three cases above analyzed, we can without diflticulty 
pronounce it to be the following : — 

75. "A thought is that which becomes the matter, or 
provides the matter of another thought." 

That is the law. It is evident that, if a thought becomes 
itself the matter, or provides the matter of another thought, 
this second thought cannot possibly arise until the first has 
arisen and provided the matter needed for it. 

Hence the natural and necessary order of all human 
thoughts is made manifest. 

76. The whole sum of thouo-hts which have or can occur 
to the human mind may be distributed and classified in 
divers orders, as follows : — 

First order of thoughts : thoughts whose matter is not 
taken from antecedent thoughts. 



NATURAL ORDER OF THOUGHT. 39 

Second order of thoughts : tlioiiglits which take their 
matter from thoughts of the lirst order, and from those only. 

Third order of thoughts : tiioiights which take their 
matter from thoughts of the second order. 

Fourth order of thoughts : thoughts that take their 
matter from thoughts of the third order. 

Fifth order of thoughts, etc. Every other order may 
be successively enumerated, each being characterized by its 
matter being taken from the order immediately preceding it. 

There is no end to this series of orders : hence the infi- 
nite development for which the human mind is organized 
towards a term it can never reach. 

77. Now that this order followed by the human mind 
in every act of the intellect is a natural one is self-evident ; 
for the nature of the mind is such that it can arrive at 
a cognition only when the matter, the object of it, has been 
antecedently given. 

78. Reason itself shows that this order is necessary and 
immutable ; since it is impossil^le for any mind to think 
or understand without a something, an object, to think of 
and understand. 

CHAPTER IX. 
ruling principle of method. 

79. Having thus discovered the immutable order of 
human cognitions, we have reached at the same time the 
solid foundation on which we can construct the method 
of teaching. This method is natural and invariable as is 
the foundation on which it rests, — ^. e. the law above 
explained which governs the human understanding. I*t is 
perfectly clear and definite, and it is the only method ; for 
all the good methods hitherto invented can be reduced 
to it ; they are but partial glimpses of it, or means of 
arriving at it, and all methods opposed to it are bad. 



40 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

80. The formula, then, which expresses the method of 
teaching in general, and the ruling principle of Method, 
is the following : — 

"Present to the mind of the child (and this applies 
to man in general) , first, the objects which belong to the first 
order of cognitions ;^ then those which belong to the second 
order ; then those which belong to the third, and so on suc- 
cessively," taking care never to lead the child to a cognition 
of the second order without having ascertained that his 
mind has grasped those of the first order relative to it, 
and the same with regard to cognitions of the third, fourth, 
and other higher orders. 

1 The word in the original is intellezioni, which seems to me better expressed 
by cognitions than by anglicizing the word into intellections, which would require 
an explanation, or paraphrasing it by acts of the understanding. 



BOOK II. 

ON THE APPLICATION TO LITTLE CHILDREN OF 
THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

SECTION I. 

ON THE NECESSITY OF CLASSIFYING THE COGNITIONS 
OF THE HUMAN MIND ACCORDING TO THEIR ORDER. 

81. From what has been hitherto said, we are led to the 
conchision that the first step towards adopting the true 
method of nature in the teaching of the young, whether pri- 
vate or pubUc, is to make an exact classification of all the 
cognitions of the human mind according to their respective 
natural orders, as laid down above. This has never yet been 
done nor even thought of, the necessity of it not having 
been perceived. 

82. Nevertheless, it is precisely what the ablest educat- 
ors have sought after, and have partially attained without 
themselves being conscious of it, and what experience has 
revealed in individual cases, without, however, its universal 
validity having been felt.-^ 

I shall exemplify it by instances taken from the simplest 
things, seeing that the principle we have laid down should 

1 " On commence k sentirqiie pour assurei* les progres cle I'education il faudrait 
decouvi'ir la methode psychologique, ou en d'autres termes, decouvi'ir les lois du 
developpement moral de I'lndividii. Mais sans pretendre connaitre encore la 
nature intime de I'ame, ou pent s'attacher a suivre la marclie des progres intel- 
lectuels des la naissance. Et comme la connaissance du monde physique et moral 
ne peut parvenir-que successivement et dans un ordre determine a un etre plonge 
dans line enti^re ignorance, on s'aperyoit bientot, que cet ordi'e decide du reveil 
des facultes diverses dans I'ame de I'enfant." — Mad. Necker de Saussure, 
U Education Progressive, Tom. I., Preface. 

41 



42 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

guide the teacher in every word he utters ; and whenever 
he departs from it, were it only in a single sentence, he 
commits an error against right method. 

80. The first author in Italy who wrote good reading- 
books for Uttle children^ wrote in detached sentences, 
mostly leaving out the conjunctions. I will give the reason 
for this omission in his own words : ' ' What is first learnt is 
to discern things themselves, and next to distinguish their 
parts. Not till later on do we group them together, and 
come to understand their unity and correlation. This sec- 
ond degree of knowledge is precisely that which is denoted 
liy conjunctions, the office of which is to bind together the 
several members of a discourse, its sentences and periods. 
If, then, the children, having arrived at the first degree of 
knowledge, that of distinguishing things from one another, 
are satisfied with that, it follows that they -will have neither 
the inclination nor the aptitude to learn the use of con- 
junctions, until, at least, their first eagerness is somewhat 
abated." 

84. The man who wrote these words had arrived, by the 
guidance of experience in a particular case, at a partial 
perception of our principle. It is perfectly true that the 
little child applies himself to understand the meaning of 
each sentence, but pays no attention to the conjunctions 
which l)ind the sentences into a whole, so that they are lost 
to him at his tender age. But why does this happen? 
The answer is to be found in our principle : the relations 
between the different parts of a discourse belong to a higher 
order of thought than the simple sentences which compose 

1 G-iuseppe Taverna, a priest of Piacenza, published liis first Reading-Boole for 
Children in Parma, 1808 Many editions were afterwards piiblished with im- 
provements by tlie author. The edition of 1817, and later ones, contain the letter 
of dedication to the I. R. Delegate of the Province of Brescia, Don Francesco 
Torriceni, from which we take the observation concerning the omission of con- 
juuctiong. 



ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 43 

it, and therefore they cannot be comprehended by the minds 
of children, who have not yet mastered the cognitions ex- 
pressed in the simple sentences. This becomes evident, if 
we reflect that the thought of a connection or relation between 
two things cannot arise until after the perception of each of 
the individual things separately. The thought, then, of indi- 
vidual things is that which provides the matter necessary to 
the thought of the relations of things, and must therefore 
be anterior to it. 

85. But is there no other order of cognitions which pre- 
cedes that of sentences in the child's mind? Yes, as- 
suredly : there is that of simple conceptions expressed 
in single words. This was revealed by experience to Vitale 
Rosi,^ and therefore he began his excellent "Manual for 
Preparatory Schools," with exercises intended to teach chil- 
dren the names of things by explaining the meaning of one 
word at a time, as the sign of a thing, not as the element 
of a proposition. 

86. The reason of the weariness of children, when we 
attempt to make them analyze propositions, is simply be- 
cause they are required, in doing so, to accomplish two 
mental operations at once, — two operations which are in 
their nature successive, and cannot be contemporaneously 
carried on. One of these is the act of understanding by 
which tlie child arrives at the meaning of single words ; the 
other is the act by which the child binds the words together 
so as to bring out of them the meaning of the proposition. 
Is it not manifest that the sense of the proposition as a 
whole cannot be reached by the human mind until it has 
gained the materials for it from more elementary ideas, — 
those which contain the meaning of the individual words or 
cognitions? The cognitions having for their object the 

1 M. Vitale Rosi, Principal' of the Seminary of Spello, published the Manual 
above quoted, in Fuliguo, 1832. 



44 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

meaning of simple words, taken one at a time, must there- 
fore be anterior in order to those which aim at the meaning 
of a whole proposition : this explains why the child cannot 
perform the latter until he has had time enough to compass 
the former. 

87. The observation of Abbe Rosi is similar to that 
which had been made before by the Abbe Taverna. The 
latter had observed that children do not at first understand 
the value of the conjunctions which bind sentences together. 
The former observed, in addition, that children do not, 
at first, understand the value of the conjunctions which 
bind single words together so as to form a sentence. Both 
observations are only particular cases of one general prin- 
ciple. 



COGNITIONS OF THE FIRST ORDEK. 45 



SECTION II. 

DN THE COGNITIONS OF THE FIRST ORDER AND THE 
CORRESPONDING STAGE OF EDUCATION. 

CHAPTER I. 

WHICH ARE THE COGNITIONS OF THE FIRST ORDER? 

88. Although we have no intention in this treatise of 
ckissifying the cognitions of the human mind, — a task not 
to be accompUshed either by one book or one man, but only 
by the hibor of the centuries to come, — yet we must enter 
into it as far as is necessary for the understandinof of our 
view, to make its iinportance manifest, and also to point out 
the way that must be taken to carry it into effect. For this 
purpose let us inquire what are the cognitions which belong 
to the first order. 

89. The general force or energy by which the mind 
actually comes to know is called attention. 

90. The object of instruction is to bring the young to 
know, and it may therefore be called the art of properly 
directing the attention of the youthful mind. 

91. There are two principles of his future knowledge 
which in the mind of man precede even the awakening 
of attention, — t\\Q fundamental feeling and the intidtion 
of being. The works on Ideology I have already pub- 
lished ^ are mostly devoted to proving the existence of these 
original principles in man, and I shall not, therefore, dwell 
upon them now. 

1 See especially The Xeiv Essay on the Origin of Ideas (translated into Eng- 
lish), // Rinnovaviento della FUosofia, and the Antrojwlogia. I hope I may assume 
that all who have read those works with some attention will find it impossible to 
doiiht that the two above-mentioned principles are essential constituents of the 
human beuig. 



46 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

92. But the fundamental feeling and the intuition of 
heiyig in the humau mind do not suffice without attention.^ 

93. Nor do these two congenital principles form the 
object of man's attention when it is first excited. It turns 
to the new stimuli, which, through pleasure or pain, 
violently alter the sentient condition of the mind. These 
stimuli are the accidental sensations. 

94. The accidental sensations are real modifications of 
the fundamental sense, but are not cognitions ; hence the 
intellectual development of man cannot begin with sensa- 
tions alone. 

95. When man is moved to apply his intellectual energy 
to that which he feels, then is the moment in which begins 
his development as an intelligent being. We must, there- 
fore, diligently examine the nature of this first application 
of intellectual energy to sensation, so as to determine rightly 
the first stage or order of human cognitions. 

1 In the intuition of being there is intellectual activity ; but this activity, 
which is essential to the intelligent mind, is not that which we call attention. 
Attention is not a primary but a secondary act ; it is not essential, but accidental 
and adventitious, — the act by which the mind concentrates and fixes its intellectual 
energy on a simple or complex object to the exclusion of every other. The intel- 
lectual energy is born of that primary activity which has already sprung from the 
intuition of being. We think it useless to repeat that there caimot be, properly 
speaking, a sensitive attention; and therefore by "attention" we always mean 
a power belonging to the intellect. — See Keio Essay, No. 73, 74, 78, and foil. 

JVote of the Translator. — For the general English reader, it may be useful to 
give some explanation of the terms fundamental feeling and intuition of being, 
and of the author's use of them. The fundamental feeling is that generally dif- 
fused feeling of our own bodies which constitutes us sentient beings. Rosmini 
shows how from this feeling we gain an assurance of the existence of our own 
bodies, and through them of external bodies, as certain as the fact of conscious- 
ness {New Essay, Nos. 701 and foil.). Tlie intuition of being is the imiate assurance 
that something is. He also shows that all our concepts and ideas are judgments 
by which we aifirm that so "ind so is so and so ; and, as in every judgment there 
must be a subject and a predicate, unless we had the first indispensable i)redi- 
cate — something is — given to us in the constitution of the inind, and with it the 
notion of being, entity in general, it would be impossible for us to pronounce 
any of those judgments by which we affirm the existence of any particular 
entity. From these two principles, as "essential constituents of the human 
being," Rosmini derives all our knowledge. They are the corner-stones of his 
philosophy. — M. Tr. G. 



PRIMARY STIMULUS OF ATTENTION. 47 

96. This examination divides itself into three questions : 
First, what is the stimuhis which primarily excites the intel- 
lectual attention of the human being? secondly, what is the 
object of his primary cognitions? thirdly and lastly, what 
is the nature of these primary cognitions? 

ARTICLE I. 

WHAT IS THE STIMULUS WHICH PRIMARILY EXCITES THE INTELLECTUAL 

ATTENTION OF MAN? 

97. With regard to the first question, it seems probable 
to me that not all the accidental sensations have power 
to excite the attention of man; that those which occur 
continually through the healthy functions of life have no 
such power, nor perhaps the many pleasurable sensations 
which so entirely satisfy the infant's nature that it wants 
nothing beyond. 

98. It seems, then, that the sensations which primarily 
excite human activity are those which bring a feeling 
of want, and which in consequence set in motion first 
instincts, and then spontaneous action.^ Thus the intel- 
lectual activity does not move gratuitously, but only when 
man feels the need of it : he calls it to his assistance, as he 
calls on his other powers when he wants to remove an 
annoyance, or to satisfy a desire. 

ARTICLE 11. 

WHAT IS THE OBJECT OF THE PRIMARY COGNITIONS? 

99. With regard to the second question, the olijects 
of intellectual attention must certainly be the objects of the 
wants which aroused it. But, not to confuse the order 
of sensation with that of intelhgence, we must distinguish 

1 I have shown in my Anthropolorin how sensations stir up instincts and all 
spontaneoxis action. 



48 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

what proceeds from mere animal instinct, and then add 
to it what proceeds from intelligence. The animal instinct 
is always stirred by a group of sensations. That group of 
sensations sets in motion the animal ; the animal activity 
thus excited seeks another group of sensations, which is the 
term of the animal want. This second group of sensations 
partly completes the first group and partly extinguishes 
it, and in any case satisfies the want. Here we have as 
yet no objects, but only associated sensations : it is always 
a sensation acting in accordance with its own laws.^ But 
intellectual activity comes to the aid of the man, who, as 
an animal, wants that group of sensations. That activity 
cannot be explained by volitions except on condition that 
it first perceives and knows, because the will is a motion 
of the mind towards a known object. The intelligence then 
must first perceive; then the man acts, — that is, he wills 
after having perceived. 

ARTICLE III. 

"WHAT ARE PERCEPTIONS? 

But what is this process of perception? By it the mind, 
the subject, places before itself certain objects. What are 
these objects ? Are they also groups of sensations ? Here 
we come to our third question : What must be the natm*e of 
the primary acts of the intellect or cognitions ? 

104. After what has been said, it will probably occur to 
us that the animal want which induces us to act, having for 
its scope and term a certain group of sensations, this group 
of sensations, and nothing more, wall be the term of per- 
ception. And at the first glance there is nothing repugnant 
in this. But, if we consider that when we speak of that 
group of sensations from our present position of advanced 

1 See on the whole of this question the Antropologia, n. 426, following 484-486. 



WHAT ARE THE PRIMARY COGNITIONS. 49 

intellectual development it has ceased to be an assemblage 
of sensations merely, but has become an assemblage of 
sensations perceived and understood by our intellect, we 
shall discover our mistake. For sensations alone, unac- 
companied by any ideal element, cannot, in their naked 
realism, become objects of the mind which has not yet 
contemplated them. How, then, does the mind come to 
contemplate and have the intuition of them? 

Simply by making them ol)jects to itself which they were 
not before. But what do we mean by ayi object? What is 
the notion common to all the objects of the mind? It is 
this,— that they are all entities, and the term ''object" 
means, hi fact,"^ only an entity. The mind, in perceiving 
sensations, transforms them into so many entities, that 
being the proper nature of the intellectual operation. The 
word "object" is used in reference to this operation, and 
the word " entity " signifies object in its most general sense. 
It follows that, apart from a mind, this (ideal) entity has 
no being, and that the mind can perceive and contemplate 
only entities. 

102. But, if sensations are not entities, how can they be 

perceived ? 

Sensations are not themselves entities, but they are cer- 
tain modes of action of entities. In analyzing sensation, 
we find that it contains two elements, — the subjective and 
extra-subjective. Considered in its subjective element, the 
entity to which the sensation belongs is the subject : sensa- 
tions are the passive actions of that entity. Considered 
in their extra-subjective element, the entity to which they 
belong is different from the subject (extra-subjective), and 
they are the active actions of that entity. The intellect, 
then, which perceives only entities, can perceive sensations 
only in the entities to which they belong. But they belong 
to two entities,— the subject and the extra-subjective body. 



50 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Now, which of these two entities is the object of the pri- 
mary cognitions? 

103. I was for a long time in donbt how to solve this 
question ; but I have finally arrived at the conclusion that 
man, in his primary cognitions, perceives his adventitious 
sensations as belonging to extra-subjective entities, — that 
is, to external bodies. I was led to this conclusion by the 
following train of reasoning : — 

We have seen that attention is that power of the mind 
which directs the intellect to one object rather than another ; 
attention itself, again, being directed by sensible wants. 
Now the wants of the human being in the first moments of 
existence relate entirely to external things, from which alone 
he tries to obtain the pleasurable sensations which he desires 
and needs. He does not, therefore, direct his intellectual 
activity to sensation as a passive property of his own being, 
but as an active property of external ol^jects, towards which 
he stretches forth, as it were, to seize from it ever new and 
keener sensations. The sensation, in so far as it is passive, 
is already complete, and he needs neither intelligence nor 
will to enjoy it ; but sensation, as an action coming from 
external bodies to his, is. that which presents itself to him, 
which he imagines and seeks before having felt it, if only 
he has some indication of it, and is impelled towards it by 
the laws of his instinct and spontaneous activity. Since, 
then, all the other powers of man tend towards the external 
objects which cause him pleasurable sensations, — as the in- 
fant, for instance, tends towards his mother's breast, — so 
also his intellectual activity must move in the same direction, 
and the first intellectual act of man must be the perception 
of external bodies. 



GRADUAL IMPROVEMENT OF PEllCEPTIONS. 51 

ARTICLE IV. 

OF WHAT IMPROVEMENT THE HUMAN PEllCEPTIONS ARE CAPABLE. 

u)4. There are degrees, however, in the perception of 
v's:terntil bodies : it is an accomplishment which tlie child 
does not master at once. It is triie that perception, as 
perceptioii, is a simple act of the mind, performed instan- 
taneously, the essential part of it ])eing the act by which the 
mind places a something different from itself, and properly 
an object, Ijctore itself, and by this act becomes conscious 
that soynetliiiuj exists. There is x^erception, then, so soon as 
the mind has affirmed this to itself. 

105. Nevertheless that inward affirmation, by which nan 
recognizes an entity, admits many differing modes and 
varieties, not indeed in itself in so far as it is a sul)jeotive 
act of the mind, but as regards its object, which may vary, 
the mind being able to affirm diverse existing things, enti- 
ties or rather diverse modes of existence or entity. 

lOG. These entities, wliich become the objects of the in- 
ward affirmations of the mind, admit of variation for two 
reasons, — 

(1) Because, although the entities are presented by sen- 
sation to the intelligence, yet the latter does not direct its 
attention fully to them for want of sufficient stimulus, and 
thus does not affirm them in all their particularities and 
qualities, ])ut only in a more or less perfect, a more or less 
definite, degree. 

(2) Because sensation itself, owing to the limitations of 
the special senses and organs, does not present^ them to 
the mind at once, with all their particularities and qualities, 
but only partially and successively. 

1 That sense is, so to speak, the stage on which objects are presented to the 
intelligence as spectator, has already been argued by us in_the OpuscoU filosofici, 
Vol. I. Cf. Teodicea, Nos. 55-GO; 88-90; 153. 



52 ON THE IIULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

107. Hence it is that 2^^^^c62^tion goes on continually per- 
fecting itself in two ways, ^. e. 1. In proportion as the 
stimuH applied to the inteUigent mind compel it to fix its 
attention on whatever is most definite in the objects pre- 
sented by sense. 2. In proportion as sense itself presents 
various aspects of the entity, in other words, more of its 
properties and activities. 

1U8. Let us say a few words on both these forms of 
gradual improvement in perceptions ; for, unless we attend 
to their capacity for improvement, we cannot arrive at 
knowing what passes in the mind of the child from the 
first moments of existence up to the freest exercise of 
reflection. 

Let us begin by considering the first mode in which the 
intellectual perceptions are improved ; and, first of all, let us 
ask what is the condition of utmost imperfection in which 
we find them. When we know this lowest point, we shall 
be able to measure from it the degrees of perfection gradu- 
ally attained by the child. 

109. The first and most imperfect affirmation inwardly 
pronounced by the child is that which, if formulated by 
us in words as yet unknown to him, would be expressed 
thus : "I feel, I have the sense of, an entity.'' 

In this sentence, he determines none of the qualities of 
the entity felt by him, but only its relation to the actual 
felt sensation, which is that of agent. Entity and agent 
are identical in this first affirmation, this first perception ; 
but the mode of the action, wiiich determines the action, 
remains in the sensation only, without becoming the object 
of the intellectual attention. The latter is satisfied wdth a 
cognition that is almost wholly negative ; for up to this 
time it is scarcely more than ideally-negative, as it contains 
only the affirmation of an agent, without expressing any 



BEGINNING OF OBSERVATION. 53 

other determinatiou beyond the relation to what is felt by 
the subject.^ 

And this is precisely that wonderful link between sensa- 
tion and intellect, which many find it so supremely dillicult 
to understand that they reject our philosophy because they 
cannot overcome the difficulty. We would urge them to 
long and deep meditation on the unity and identity of the 
sensitive and intelligent subject, which, once understood, all 
difficulty disappears. For he who has arrived at seeing that 
identit}^ sees also, at once, how the su])ject (the human 
mind) can find in sensation the determination of the entity 
which it sees and affirms through the intellect. But we 
have spoken of these things elsewhere, and must not re- 
peat ourselves too often. 

110. That which the intellect perceives in its first and 
most imperfect perception of an ol)ject is, then, the action 
which an entity different from the subject has performed on 
the sul:)ject, but nothing more. It does not think of the mode 
of such action, as it takes place in sensation ; and this mode, 
remaining outside the intellectual attention, all the special 
qualities and properties of the object remain also outside 
its cognition. The subject knows only that there is an entity 
which acts, but it feels and does not knoiv how it acts. 

Later on, indeed, the subject (man), impelled by his wants, 
fixes his attention not only on the agent, but on the mode 
also of its action, and it is then that his perception of the 
entity becomes more perfect by becoming gradually more 
positive. In fact, it is by observation of the manner in 
which an entity acts upon us, and of the effects which it 
produces in us, that we find out its properties and qualities 
and all its conditions. This is precisely the gradual work 

1 The reader must remember that I make negative or ideally-nefjative cognition 
of a thing to consist in two elements, — 1. An entity in general ; 2. A determina- 
tion of it, consisting in a simple relation. — See Neio Essay y No. 1234 and foil. 



54 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

performed by the iniiid ; and here l^egius the art of observa- 
tion, which, issning from the infant's cradle, becomes a giant 
in the mind of a Galileo, and each day reveals to man new 
secrets of nature. 

We have here traced the first growth of perception, which 
increases and becomes more perfect in proportion as the in- 
tellectual attention is dh-ected to every part of the sensations, 
and conveys them, as it were, one by one, from the sense to 
the understanding. I mean that the mind perceives them 
one after another, by its intelligence, and distinctly affirms 
them l)y its inward judgment. 

111. But the intellectual attention cannot go beyond this 
to observe what is not brought before it by sensation. This 
is another of its limitations ; this is the second line of prog- 
ress assigned to perception. Its field is ever increasing with 
the increase in the number of sensations presented to it by 
the matter or term of its operation. 

The object perceived by the infant for the first time varies 
to his perception as it comes before him again and again, — 
that is, the child, although he always perceives that object 
as acting on him and producing a sensation, does not per- 
ceive it as acting in the same manner or in the same degree, 
nor as producing only the sensation first felt, but others 
also, one after the other. At first, then, he perceives 
a simple force, which produces in him a given sensation, — 
the touch of a hand, for example. But afterwards he suffers 
a number of sensations, which reveal to him so many actions 
coming from agents other than himself ; and at last he dis- 
covers (through the identity of space) ^ that all the sensa- 
tions come to him from a single agent, or one he believes 

1 In the Orif/in of Ideas (Nos. 941 and foil.) it is shown liow the reference of 
several perceptions to one object as their cause results in the mind in virtue of 
the identity of the space to which thece various sensations are referred. It was 
his partial glimpse of this truth which led Descartes to believe that he had found 
in space the actual essence of body. 



PROCESS OF PERCEPTION. 55 

to be single, — that is, from a body. Thus at first, in the 
sensations of touch, smell, hearing, and taste, he will per- 
ceive so many different forces, and therefore entities ; but 
he will very soon arrive, by greater attention, at the belief 
that all these entities are only one body, from which proceed 
this variety of effects upon him, and thus he will improve his 
perception of that body. 

112. By degrees his mind will take another step, and will 
harmonize sight with touch. At first, he will perceive by 
sight one single object, one single force ; so that all the 
objects before his eyes are seen as one, and form a variously- 
colored surface. But very soon he will learn, by the joint 
exercise of touch and sight, to read the various colors pre- 
sented to his mind as signs of distinct things, not super- 
ficial only, but solid ; and thus through the eye, by means of 
a judgment, he comes to the perception of external bodies. 

113. Hence the perceptions of external bodies, which con- 
stitute the first order of cognitions, are arrived at through 
the following mental processes : — 

1. The mind becomes conscious with each sensation of 
the existence of an agent, the object of the spirit, in which 
resides the essence of intellectual perception. 

2. The mind unites various sensations, received from the 
four senses, touch, smell, taste, and hearing, each of which 
separately had made it conscious of the existence of an 
agent, so that it now attributes them to a single agent, the 
common origin of all : thus it perceives body, — ^^ e. forms 
the general idea of body. 

3. The mind distinguishes in the single sensation of sight 
the different colors which it learns to recognize as signs of 
those same bodies perceived by touch, and to which it has 
already learnt to refer many sensations of the various 
senses. 

These are distinct operations of the mind, but theii* effect 



56 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

is always intellectual perception; and therefore they do not 
constitute various orders of cognition, but one only, the 
first : it is always perception itself that the mind, in all 
these operations, repeats and improves.-^ 

ARTICLE V. 

TO THE FIRST ORDER OF COGNITIONS, BESIDES PERCEPTIONS, BELONG ALSO 
THE MEMORY OF PERCEPTIONS ; THE IMPERFECT-SPECIFIC IDEAS ; ANT) 
THE ASSOCIATIONS OF THE THREE SPECIES ENUMERATED, TOGETHER 
WITH THE WHOLE ACTION AWAKENED BY THEM IN THE MIND. 

114. The mind performs several other operations without 
going beyond the first order of intellectual acts or cognitions. 
In fact, the imaginative memory, which retains and repro- 
duces past sensations, cannot be said to belong to another 
order of cognitions ; for it changes neither the object nor its 
term nor the matter of the operation, but only the faculty 
whereby the mind operates upon that matter. Therefore the 
perception which I remember and reproduce is always the 
same as regards knowledge. I know by that operation only 
the very same mental object and no other. 

115. In the same manner the association of several per- 
ceptions, or imaginative memories of perception, does not go 
beyond the first order of cognitions when it consists only of 
a simple association of coexistences in the mind, without 
any analysis or synthesis of the perceptions by the under- 
standing. 

116. In the third place, the instincts, and in general the 
whole spontaneous activity set in motion by perceptions, 
and by the memory and imaginary reproduction of them, are 
operations which do not exceed the limits of the first order 
of cognitions, of the first stage of human intelligence. 

1 Hence we see that, althoiiirli there is a progress of the mind from one order of 
cognitions to the other, and it is tliis which marks the steps of our advance, there 
is also another progress made by the mind within the same order of cognitions, 
— a progress which goes on through life, and never oyuser. 



FULL-SPECIFIC IMPERFECT IDEAS. 57 

117. Ill the fourth place, the full-specific but imperfect 
ideas belong to the same stage. -^ 

We mean by "full-specific" ideas, the things themselves 
which we perceive, considered merely as possible, without 
adding the thought of their real existence. 

118. If I perceive a pomegranate, I retain the memory of 
my perception. The memory of the pomegranate, which 
yesterday I saw, touched, tasted, intellectually perceived, 
is more than the simple idea of it. For the object of my 
thought is not simply the image of that pomegranate con- 
sidered as a type, a possibility of pomegranates, but it is 
that image referred to the pomegranate of yesterday ; it is 
the image of that particular pomegranate, and I, in remem- 
bering it, do not think solely of the image, but of the actual 
thing. But, if I should entirely forget the pomegranate of 
yesterday, and 3^et should in fancy contemplate the image 
of a pomegranate, which image I have retained from my 
previous perception, though I do not now refer it to the 
perception which I suppose myself to have utterly forgotten, 
in that case the image contemplated by my understanding 
represents to me only a possible pomegranate, not this or 
that one, or any real pomegranate. The object of my 
thought in this case is an idea which I term the full-specific 
imperfect idea. 

119. I call tliis idea S2iecific because it is not attached to 
any real individual, but is the type of infinite possible in- 
dividuals : it determines, therefore, a class or species of 
individuals. 

I call it fully -specific because I am supposing that it pre- 
serves all the qualities, even the accidental ones, of the 
pomegranate previously perceived by me, so that it is not an 
abstract idea, l)ut one which represents individuals invested 
with all their peculiarities. 

1 It is necessary to consider attentively the difference between the three modes 
of the specific idea of which we have spoken in the Origin of Ideas, Nos. 648-50. 



58 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Finally, I call that full-specific idea impei'fect because that 
type does not represent to me the perfect pomegranate, but 
a pomegranate such as the one I perceived, with all the de- 
fects and imperfections which may belong to it. 

120. The action of the understanding, in passing from 
perception to the full-specific imperfect idea, is that which is 
called generalization. 

This passage is exceedingly easy, because, the perceptive 
acts of the mind being transitory, as soon as the object is 
withdrawn from the external sense, perception ceases. But 
though it has ceased, it leaves behind it two traces or effects, 
— the image of the thing perceived, which may be suggested 
by our fancy, or recalled by our wdll or by some external ac- 
cident ; and the memory of the past perception. These two 
effects differ in themselves ; and, although so long as they 
coexist in the mind they may easily be taken the one for the 
other, yet, when the memory ceases and the image remains, 
or when the image fades away, the memory remains, or 
when one or the other becomes faint, they are found to be 
distinct in the mind. Still more do they become separate 
and distinct when the child receives other perceptions from 
the same thing ; for then the image is the same, while, on 
the contrary, each perception brings a distinctly different 
remembrance. 

Again, if the child receives perceptions from other things 
almost exactly similar to the first, — as for instance of 
several oranges, which could not be distinguished from 
each other except by minute differences to which the child 
at first pays no attention, — his memories multiply, while 
the image remains one and is common to all the objects. 
Hence it easily happens that the image in the mind stands 
out distinctly from the memory of past percei>tions, and in 
this separate condition the mind quickly finds the basis of 
the full-specific imperfect idea of which we have spoken. 



PERIOD OF FIRST COGNITIONS. 59 

because it sees tit once and naturally, in the image it pos- 
sesses, the image of a thing which does not exist but is 
possible. 

CHAPTER II. 

ON THE ACTIVITIES WHICH RESPOND TO THE FIRST <)!iI)EK 

OF COGNITIONS. * 

ARTICLE I. 

DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE TWO FIRST PERIODS OF CHILDHOOD, 

121. In summing up what has been previously said, w^e 
find that to cognitions of the first order belong perceptions ; 
the memory of perceptions (images taken alone .are not 
cognitions, but internal sensations) ; the specific-imperfect 
ideas based on the image ; the various associations of per- 
ceptions, memories, and specific-imperfect ideas ; and, finally, 
the instincts and voluntary operations which follow upon this 
first stage of intellectual development. 

122. When does this intellectual development begin in 
the infant? There is probably not a moment of its life in 
which it has not accidental sensations, at least internal 
ones,^ — sensations which began in the mother's womb. 
Does intellectual activity accompany every sensation from 
the very first? 

I incline to believe the negative. I have already said that 
the simple sensations do not arouse the activit}^ of the un- 
derstanding ; the sensation, which ends with itself, pacifies 
rather than excites to new activity. Tliose alone which give 
rise to a feeling of 2va7it, the want of new sensations, excite 
the intellectual attention. 

123. It is true that these physical wants which excite the 
intellectual activity of the infant must arise very early, and 
with them come restlessness and the attempt to satisfy them, 

1 I say " at least internal," because I suppose the fatus to be in a state of sleep, 
as I have said in the Anthropolof/y (No. 359). Usually the infant does not open 
its eyes until eight days after its birth. *' 



60 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which will also last some time before they succeed in rousing 
intelligence to their aid. I conjecture, therefore, that the 
moment in which intelligence awakens to activity is marked 
by the infant's first smile. ^ 

By this ineffable expression of its joy, the infant seems 
to hail the light of the day which is dawning upon him. His 
reasonable soul rejoices in the truth which it recovers, and 
springs forward, as it were, to clasp it. How great, how 
solemn a moment to the human soul, must be the first act 
of its intelligence, the sense of a new and boundless life, 
the discovery of its own immortality ! Is it possible that an 
event so stupendous and so startling to the infant, though 
the adult can form no idea of it, should not be manifested 
externally by signs of exuberant joy? You are right, then, 
O mothers, who watch so eagerly for your infant's first 
smile, who try to induce it, Avho welcome it with such trem- 
bling joy in every fibre of your being. You alone are the 
true interpreters of those first utterances of infancy which, 
in the shape of a smile, break from the lips and the eyes 
and the whole countenance of the little intelligent ])eing ; 
you alone understand its myster}^ ; you understand that 
from that hour he knows you and speaks to you ; and you, 
the first object of human intelligence, you alone know how 
to answer this language of love, and to make yourselves the 

1 The first period, in which the child has only a sensitive activity, would thus 
last about six weeks, as the infant scarcely smiles or sheds tears before it is six 
weeks old. The first week of its existence would be spent, under the influence of 
the external air and of the stimuli which surroiind and press upon it on all sides, 
in the passage from the dormant state, during which sensation is wholly internal 
and wrapped up in self, into that of complete wakefulness, in which it becomes 
conscious of the world without, and develops its sensitive activity through com- 
munication with the corporeal objects that are as yet strange to it. This it does, 
setting in motion the alternate action of the nervous system, which will continue 
throughout life (see Anthropology, Nos. 355-365). AVhen this great operation, 
which requires the whole effective activity of the new-born child, is completed, and 
the important nervous action properly regulated (which will take about six weeks), 
the child has the necessary leisure for the next great operation, the settmg in motion 
of the intellectual faculties. 



VITAL AND SENSUAL INSTINCTS, 61 

image and type of the truth which is intelligible, and which 
shines by its own light. ^ 

124. If we admit this conjecture, it follows that, from the 
earliest infancy, there are two well-defined periods to be 
distinguished, — 

1. The period of merely sensitive development, which 
begins with existence itself. 

2o The period of the first stage of intellectual develop- 
ment, which begins with the child's first smile. 

ARTICLE II. 

ACTIVITY PROPER TO THE FIRST PERIOD. 

125. During the first period, the child has only feelings 
and animal wants, and its activity is solely animal.^ 

1 The smile of the infant is looked upon by mothers as a sign of intelligence. 
Here are a mother's words upon it: "At this backward stage of intelligence, it 
(the infant) is interested by the human face. While nothing material yet attracts 
it, it is awakened to sympathy ; a cheerful countenance, a caressing tone, will win it 
to a smile ; the little creature is evidently animated by happy feelings ; we, who 
know their expression, recognize them in him with delight. In this fact there is 
nothing that belongs to the senses. The person who stands beside his cradle is 
sometimes not even his nurse, and has perhaps disturbed him, and subjected him 
to tiresome manipulation. Never mind ; she has smiled at him, and he has felt 
himself loved, and loves in I'eturn. It would seem as if that new soul had the 
intuition of another and said to it : 'I know thee.' " (Mad. Necker de Saussure, 
De V Education Progressive, s. ii. c. ii.) I have already expressed elsewhere my 
suspicion that, in the intercourse between two human beings, there occurs, besides 
material impressions and animal sensations, a recondite communication between 
their minds, of which, however, the medium is sensation. In the smile of the 
infant something of this kind seems to take place. In this case, the infant intelli- 
gence seems to receive its first impulse through this mysterious communication. 
Incipe, pari^e jnier, risu cognoscere matrem. — (Virgil, Eel., iv. 50.) 

2 By " activity " I mean a real stirring of the child's faculties. Now, in order 
that they should be stirred, not only must the child have sensations, but these 
sensations must produce a want of other sensations, and thus generate the instinc- 
tive actions. If we remember this, we shall not wonder that the intuition of 
being, imiate in man, fails to produce in him of itself any activity. This intui- 
tion is a completed act of the subject man; and, when an act is completed, the sub- 
ject rests in it. It is necessary, therefore, that the subject should feel impelled to 
an act not yet performed, in order to arouse him into motion, — that is, to the 
action by which he carries out and completes the act. See, as regards the manner 
in wliich several feelings blend into one, and produce that state of restlessness 
which I have denominated affection, from which springs the instinct that moves 
as, Anthropology t No. 485. 



62 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

This activity is in part congenital in the animal, and I 
have given it the name of vital instinct in the work I have 
entitled "Anthropology," to which I must refer the reader 
who may wish to inquire further into this matter. 

There also he will see how from the vital instinct arises 
the sensual instinct^ another branch of the animal activity 
of which we are speaking. 

126. It would be difficult to define whether the first work- 
ings of sensual instinct l)egin in the mother's womb, or as 
soon as the animal comes in contact with the atmosphere, or 
some time later. ^ 

It seems likely, however, that the first impulse given to 
the exercise of the sensual instinct is the want of food.^ 

Respiration, the internal and slow combustion which 
begins in him the moment he sees the light, consumes the 
oxygen and carbon necessary to his blood, and thence the 
want excited in him to repair their loss by food. The want 
of food is excited in the same manner by the losses his 
body sustains through perspiratiou and other secretions. 
The motion of the lips by which he clings to the mother's 
breast is, therefore, one of the first acts of the sensual 
instinct.^ 

The sensual instinct, then, is first stu-red to action hy pain 
rather than by pleasure, using the word "pain" to mean any 
kind of discomfort, au}^ kind of troublesome want. 

127. The tronhlesome tvants always remain, even later on, 
the most efficacious stimuli to the activity of the sensual 
instinct, but this instinct very soon passes from its primitive 
state. It is modified by the experiments it makes ; for, as I 

1 See on this question the Netv Essay, No. 1294. 

- Respiration belongs to the vital instinct. 

3 Tlie child begins very early to put out his mouth towards external objects, 
and when he can use his hands he carries everything to his mouth ; from which 
it would seem that he is impelled to use bis mouth, and that his gums and lips are 
his first organs of touch. 



COMMUNICATION THROUGH SENSATION. 63 

have already observed/ the activity of any human faculty 
produces, besides the momentary action, a permanent effect 
on the man, a new state and condition, especially in the 
faculty exercised. The sensual instinct, then, which on its 
first awakening is stirred only by pain, soon comes to be 
drawn out by pleasure also, and pleasure becomes a want 
to it. Thus, when the child, through the satisfaction of his 
most troublesome wants, has procured for himself sensations 
which he has found to be pleasurable (for kind Nature has 
added pleasure to the satisfaction of our wants) , he has two 
motives in seeking sensations, — to avoid pain and to enjoy 
pleasure. From these two sources springs the craving for 
sensations, which henceforth accompanies man through life, 
and wdiich becomes so various, so powerful, and also so 
capricious and ill-regulated. 

128. I have already hinted that I more than suspect a 
communication between human souls through sensation. 
This would be a fact worth verifying by the most careful 
observation. Let me add, always in the way of conjecture, 
that I am inclined to believe that not only does the subject 
(man) receive, together with the sensation produced in 
him by a person, a feeling which is the immediate effect of 
the intelligent soul acting through the sensations excited, 
but that a similar communication takes place in purely sen- 
sitive beings. I find it difficult to believe that the kitten, 
when it plays with a ball of paper, or a straw tied to the 
end of a string, is only seeking to vary its material sensa- 
tions : it seems to me rather that it is instinctivelv seeking 
in its play something animated, something which lives and 
moves of itself, and that it ceases to play as it grows older 
because it knows better, and has learnt to distinguish be- 
tween what is and is not alive. Mad. Necker makes a 
somewhat subtle observation about children in relation to 

1 See La Societa e il suofine (" Society and its End "), L. IV. c. vi. 



64 ON THE niTLTNG PRINCIPLE OE METHOD. 

this : she is giving the reason why children get tired of their 
toys, and says that this happens when they have exhausted 
every way of looking at them and pulling them to pieces. 
So long as there is something new to find out in them, the 
child thinks there is spontaneous motion, a soul, in material 
things ; but, when all novelty is at an end, then the thing is 
dead to him and he cares no more about it.^ To this same 
tendency towards animated things should, perhaps, be at- 
tributed the attraction which shining objects exercise on 
certain animals. The lark, it is said, is attracted by a 
mirror ; the nightingale, by any kind of light ; the magpie 
instinctively robs and conceals precious stones.^ But, leav- 
ing aside these and similar facts as to the delusive belief 
of animals in the life of whatever moves or gives them 
varying sensations, it is certain that between animals of the 
same species there is a peculiar intimacy which resembles 
friendship. How puppies and kittens delight in playing 
with each other ! Many animals liye gregariously in flocks 
and herds, like families, tribes, peoples. All that regards 
their mutual action, in the reproduction and care of the 
young, seems to presuppose this power of communication 
between them. Meanwhile we may place among incontest- 
able facts that the sensations received by animals from 
each other are of a kind altogether different from those they 
receive from inanimate objects. The affection shown by 
parents for their offspring, in all species, is an instinct which 
might easily be explained by my supposition. A certain 
sensuous affinity is found even in animals of different 
species. Dogs, horses, elephants, etc., take mutual likings, 
and many animals are bound to man by close ties of domes- 
tication and faithful service. To the same principle of a 
secret action, interchanged between their souls, might be 

1 V Education Progressive, L. III. c. v. 

2 Every one knows Rossini's opera of the Gazza Ladra. 



INFLUENCE OF HABIT. 65 

attributed the antipathies and enmities of certain animals 
towards others, such as that of the cat for the rat, etc. 
Given, then, this communication between sensitive beings, 
it must take place in the child also ; but I do not think its 
action begins before that of the intelligent soul, and it ap- 
pears to me that both have their point of departure in the 
first smile of the cliild. 

129. Another principle of action belonging to pure ani- 
mality (although a similar principle is also found in the 
order of intelligence) is that of imitation. We have already 
sufficiently explained it elsewhere.^ We will only add here 
that the animastic ^ feelings make the explanation still more 
clear and easy. One soul feels that its companion is in a 
given state, say of joy.^ Sympathy — that is, the taking on 
of a fellow-feeling — arises from natural benevolence, and 
from sympathy comes the instinct of imitation. Sympathy, 
in this case, is the passive effect ; imitation, its corresponding 
activity. 

130. Among the pleasures felt by the animal, and which 
he soon learns to desire eagerly, is that of action. Action 
brings with it many special physical pleasures, the mere 
acceleration of the circulation of the blood increasing vital- 
ity and the sense of it. But there is a pleasure inherent in 
action itself beyond the partial physical pleasure belonging 

1 The reader who desires will find it in the Anthropologij, Nos. 487-490. 

2 We give this name to the feelings excited in animals by their communications 
with each other. 

3 It is necessary to know that certain feelings of the soul, such as joy for in- 
stance, are manifested through the sensual instinct in certain bodily movements, 
such as smiling. Vice versa, man perceives in his compaiiion's smile the rejoicing 
soul. Having perceived this, he takes on the same feeling, and from the same 
internal gladness follows the same external effect of smiling. Sometimes the 
contrary happens ; that is, seeing the smiling countenance, he, by the faculty which 
unites perception (passive) and reproduction (active), imitates the smile, and thence 
passes on to the joy manifested by it ; that is, he sympathizes with it, because the 
smile and the sense of joy are united, and the one produces the other, and vice 
versa. 



66 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

to any special action ; for the greater our activity, tlie more 
we seem to live. Hence pleasure in action springs from, 
and grows witli, experience up to a certain stage in the 
animal, and becomes on occasion the impulse to motion. 

131. Finally, the animal faculties also put on habits. 
Physical nature is full of order, but this order itself under- 
goes some modification through habits. Moreover, hal^it 
makes certain actions easier and more pleasurable, and there- 
fore makes any interruption or cessation of them more dis- 
agreeable. Hence spring habitual tastes and instincts, which 
in this way become, in the animal and the infant, a new 
principle of action. 

To sum up : the activities of the child which l^elong to the 
animal order are as follows: 1. The instinct which springs 
from the want of avoiding pain ; this is the primitive stage 
of instinct ; ^ 2. The instinct which springs from the want 
simpW to feel and to enjoy pleasurable sensations ; 3. The 
instinct towards animated things, whence arises s^^mpathy ; 
4. The instinct of imitation following on sympathy ; 5. The 
instinct and want of action, solely for the pleasure which 
arises from the exercise of active power; 6. Habit. 

ARTICLE III. 

THE ACTIVITIES PROPER TO THE SECOND PERIOD. 

132. In the second period begins the action of intelli- 
gence ; perceptions and imaginal ideas are formed ; hence 
a new activity must be developed ; for, as we have repeat- 
edly said, every passive sensation awakens in man a cor- 
responding action, and from the understanding must arise 
rational action, the action of the will. 

The first motor of the will consists in tliose volitions which 

1 We are speaking of the sensual instinct ; anterior to this comes the vital 
instinct, but that does not belong to the development of the child. 



SENSUAL AND INTELLECTUAL ACTIVITIES. 67 

we have named affective,^ in which the subject that feels and 
wills, wills the object perceived, not because it is judged to 
be good, but merely because it is felt to be pleasurable ; 
mysterious volitions, as difficult^ to understand thoroughly 
as intellectual perception itself. But, although aware that 
few have formed a clear conception of volitions of this kind, 
while many are ready to deny their existence, we are never- 
theless constrained to admit it and appeal to those few who 
by earnest thought penetrate into the nature of such voli- 
tions, and to whom, therefore, their real existence ceases to 
be a matter of dou])t. 

It must be observed here that the sensual activity does not 
cease with the appearance of the intellectual activity, ])ut 
the development of the child becomes more complex and 
more difficult to describe from the mutual influence of the 
sensual and intellectual operations, and from the multipli- 
city of their actions. Nevertheless, we must attempt to 
give a brief description of what takes place in the human 
being during this second period. 

133. In the first period, the earliest sensations are those 
received from inanimate things, and not till later does the 
child experience the animastic feelings of which we have 
spoken. 

But in the second period, in which the intellect is set in 
motion, the reverse takes place : the first step of the cogni- 
tive faculty seems, as we have said, to be that which leads 
man to perceive animated things ; the child perceives his 
mother's soul in her countenance, and soon he begins to 
seek a life and soul in all other things, making it probable 

1 See Anthropology, Nos. 612-16. 

2 As the nature of this difficulty may not be at once apparent to the ordinary 
reader, it may be useful to explain that the difficulty lies in conceiving a volition 
without an intelligent motive, the latter being always a judgment of the under- 
standing that the object willed is good. It is the presence of this motive which 
essentially distinguishes volition from instinct. — Note of the Translator. 



68 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

that not till much later does he come to be fully persuaded 
of that great marvel, the existeuce of inanimate things.^ 

As the animastic sensations by their natm-e produce in the 
child physical affection and from that sympathy^ so the ani- 
mastic perceptions produce benevolence^ good-will, which is 
already an incipient habitual and affective volition. In 
fact, benevolence, which is a rational affection, cannot be 
conceived unless we suppose a living being towards whom 
it is exercised ; for what is inanimate, if we conceive it really 
as such, and do not associate our conception of it imagina- 
tively with some element of life, may indeed be precious 
to us for its utility, but we cannot love it, or feel towards 
it that affection termed benevolence. 

134. Now the child, in the fulness oi his affection and 
good-will, infuses them into ever^^thing, and this is a fresh 

1 So long as the child remains ignorant of natural laws, and is not quite con- 
vinced that there are things without life, he has an immense propensity to attril)- 
iite life to everything. It may be useful to place before the reader some facts in 
support of this statement; and, although such facts are common enough, and 
every one who has been in the habit of watching children could supply similar 
ones, I will avail myself of those collected by Mad. Necker de Saussure, as fol- 
lows: — 

" Give a child a sugar-plum in a box : he will open the box every minute to 
see if the sugai'-plum is still there. Hide yourself behind a curtain, and his delight 
when he sees you reappear proves that it would have been to him a most sorrow- 
ful, but by no means unexpected, occurrence if you had not reappeared at all. 
The keenness of his joy sj^rings often from his relief from certain fears we should 
not have susi)ected. This obscure personification of inanimate things often adds 
force to his impressions. Not only do his toy-soldiers become to him living beings, 
although at bottom he knows the truth of the matter, but his other playthings, 
the furniture, the things he uses, seem to him endowed with some degree of life ; 
and the tears he sheds over their destruction show something more than regret for 
the loss of a thing that was useful to him : a real compassion mixes with it. * Poor 
tea-cup!' he says, his little heart swelling as he looks on the fragments of the cup 
he has broken; ' I was so fond of it! ' 

"Moreover, the child believes in the life of whatever has motion, — the wind, 
the thunder, the flames, will to burn, to destroy, to carry away. 

" In early childhood this illusion may be accompanied by deep and true feeling: 
the affection of little girls for their dolls is sometimes very touching. A very little 
girl whose leg had to be cut off bore the operation without a cry, only clasping her 
doll in her arms. ' Now I am going to cut your doll's leg off,' said the surgeon, smil- 
ing, when the operation was over: the poor little thing, who had suffered so much 



SYMPATHY OF CHILDREN WITH LIFE. 69 

proof of what we liave already said, that all things are to him 
alive aud intelligent. When the little girl rushes to her 
mother's arms, aud after having smothered her with kisses 
runs to kiss aud caress the table or the chair, she certainly 
does not lavish her caresses on them as inanimate things, 
but pours out on them some of her affection for living beings, 
without stopping to consider whether these are living or not. 
Yea, the love of the sentient and rational creature supposes 
by its very essence a sentient and rational object, whether 
this be real or only imagined. Such, then, are the first affec- 
tive volitions. And, as'Nature implants first the sensitive 
affection as the preparation and beginning of the intelligent 
affection, which alone is truly love, so she implants in the 
infant, to dispose it to sensitive affection, a physical joy 
from its overflowing organic life, filling it with pleasure as 
the best preparation for the sensitive affection. Thus, in the 

without a word, broke into a passion of tears at this cruel proposal." Other facts 
of a similar kind may be found in the ' Education Progressive,' L. Ill, c. v. Here 
I must point out tliat what takes place in the child's mind when we say that he 
sees life in another face, or in things that move, is not a process of reasoning, 
for to argue from himself to other objects would require far more advanced de- 
velopment than we suppose him to have reached. He has an immediate percep- 
tion ; in other words, he perceives something in the sensations produced in him by 
animated thhigs, quite different from the effect produced by a dead and inert 
thing, and he finds greater pleasure in the former than the latter. Yet more; if 
that which man perceives is always an entity, a something that exists, as I have 
shown in the ' New Essay on the Origin of Ideas,' may we not suspect that life 
is essential to an entity, and that we have to make an effort to believe in an entity 
without life as almost an impossibility? This suspicion I will show to be a truth 
capable of demonstration hi the Ontology, please God I publish it. Let it suffice 
for the present that I have laid it before my readers' minds as a suspicion and a 
conjecture. 

Nations in their infancy attribute life to inanimate objects for the same 
reason as the child. This fact, both in the common people and in chiUlren, was 
observed by the ancients. Here are the lines quoted from the poet Lucillus by 
Lactantius, Instit. I. 23: — 

Terriculas Lamias Fauni, quas Pompiliiquc 
Instituere Niunce ; tremit has ; hie omnia ponit. 
Ut pucri infantes credunt signa omnia ahena 
Vivere, et esse-homines ; sic isti omnia ficta, 
Vera putant ; credunt signis con inesse in ahenis 
Pcrgula pictorum ; veri nihil ; omnia ficta. 



70 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

admirable constitution of the human creature, all is ])rouglit 
into union and harmony. The sensitive being, already full 
of happiness, is duly disposed to feel and attach itself to 
another sensitive being. In man this natural affection soon 
acts on the will, which finds pleasure in it, and generates 
within itself, as it were, the love, which again becomes the 
source of other rational joys, mingled with the primitive 
animal ones, aikd so, in a happy circle, disposing man to 
more affection and more love.-^ 

Assuredly, in that first dawn of human intelligence there 
is neither merit nor free-will nor conscience. But who that 
considers it attentively can deny that there is already a mo- 
rality? What is morality l^ut the act, or the disposition of 
an intelligent will towards other intelligent beings ? If the 
will gives its affection to these beings, — that is, if it loves 
them as they require to be loved, — it is certainly good ; but, 
if it assumes toward them an attitude of aversion and hatred, 
it is evil. The observation, then, of the natural benevolence 
of children confirms what I have asserted in the ' ' Treatise 
on Conscience " respecting the existence of a morality ante- 
rior to conscience, as, on the other hand, the theories there 
put forward throw a vivid light on the results of the dili- 
gent observation of what happens in the earliest stages of 
infancy. 

135. Yet more : the period of six months may be as- 
signed as that proper to affective volitions. After that 
age, it would seem that a real judgment of the goodness 

1 Let me here again quote Mad. Xecker : " Quand on pense aux plaisirs si vifs, 
si faciles de cet age, a ce present, temps imique oii se passe I'enfame, et temps dont 
notre amour peut si bien disposer en sa faveur, a cette gaite intarissable, a ces 
portes ouvertes de toutes parts a la joie, et fermes aux soucis et aux chagrins, qui 
peut se refuser a I'idee qu'il y a dans le contentement deces etres si chers une dis- 
pensation de la Providence? Et si, comme I'a dit unhomme celebre a tout age le 
bonheur est I'atmosphere la plus favorable aux germes des vertus naissantes, ne 
semblet-it pas que I'Oronnateur supreme a voulu preparer la moralite de I'homme 
par la longue felicite de I'enfant?" — De V Education Progressive, L. III. c. v. 



VOLITIONS BECOME ESTIMATIVE AND MORAL. 71 

of tilings takes place, which immediately leads to estimative 
volitions.^ 

It is difficult to ascertain when the child pronounces a real 
internal judgment on things which are physically pleas- 
urable to his senses, because, the pleasure being derived 
from the senses, there is no need of the understanding to 
excite him to action. But, in the case of a pleasure derived 
from something understood, tliere must be an intervening 
operation of the intelligence in order to produce it. Now, at 
about six or seven months old, we observe that the child 
begins to admire things as beautiful ; and therefore it is 
certain that his intellect estimates things in themselves, and 
his will puts forth in consequence the volitions which we 
have termed estimative. Here morality once more makes 
its ai)pearance, and here properly begins the in'actieal esti- 
mation of objects as distinguished from the perception of 
them ; while in affective volitions the practical estimation 
of things was one with the first perception of them.^ 

136. AVe see spleudidW exemplified in these facts the dis- 
interestedness which always accompanies a practical estimate 
having justice for its standard. But let us look at the facts 
more closely, and once more we will avail ourselves of those 
collected and attested for us by the able author of the "Edu- 
cation Progressive," whom we have already so often quoted, 
and to whose diligent observation and pregnant reflections 
we shall have to refer to again and again. 

" Rousseau has well observed that, in certain dialogues between 
the nurse and the child, the words of the former and the inarticu- 

1 I distinguish estimative from appreciative volitions, giving the former name 
to those volitions which judge a thing to be good without comparing it with any- 
thing else, and the term appreciative volitions to those which judge a thing to be 
good as compared with some one or Inore other things. 

2 The perception of intelligent beings precedes, as we have said, the affective 
volitions. If these were preceded by the perception of entities not intelligent, 
they would involve no morality, for a moral volition must have its term in an 
intelligence. 



72 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

late cooing of the latter liave much the same modulation of sound.^ 
Often the baby coos over inanimate things, Avhich it does not dis- 
tinguish from the animate ; but, though he may deceive himself in 
seeing life where there is none, he never overlooks it where it is.^ 
Sometimes his cooing is addressed to a shining metal button, some- 
times to a pane of glass reflecting the sunlight, and seems to tell 
them that they are pretty and give him pleasure ; he expresses his 
good-will toward them ; sometimes he utters little cries, joyful and 
eager, as if to attract their attention. Still, we have here, as yet, 
no real language, if we mean by ' language ' a means voluntarily 
adopted to exercise influence on others ; the child is asking for 
nothing, he is not calling ; he expects no result whatever from his 
little song. The infant, always in a stata of absolute dependence, 
possesses less tlian any other living creature of the same age the 
means oi self-defence, and yet he already manifests the two great 
prerogatives "wliich are to raise him so high above other animals. 
The faculty of denoting objects by conventional signs has already 
been often mentioned as one of these ; but there is another equally 
admirable and yet less noticed, which is developed long before the 
former : I mean the tendency so common in the infant to take an 
interest in a number of things quite apart from its instinct of self- 
preservation. Already, at six months old, his life is no longer con- 
centred in himself ; it expands externally, and the mind begins to 
recognize those wide relations which one day will subject to it the 
material universe and to busy itself with laying out the lines within 
which it will ultimately embrace all things. The most intelligent 
among animals have an extremely narrow circle of interests : what 
does not serve to protect or feed them is to them as non-existent ; 
they love, but do not admire ; they have no curiosity : the child, on 
the contrary, takes delight in everything ; he has pleasures which 
may be termed disinterested, so little do they depend on the senses: 
utility is nothing to him, while already he feels beauty; such as it 

1 Emile, L. I. Modulation or intonation is the result of several sounds, and 
yet presupposes a unitive force coniltining them into one. Hence we see how early 
that marvellous force, so little considered and almost ignored hitherto by philoso- 
phers, intervenes in the operations of the animal, whether brute or rational. 

2 It is, therefore, easier to the child to conceive an animate than an inanimate 
being ; let that most remarkable fact be noted. The inanimate being is a mystery to 
the intelligence of the child ; the animate being appears to him simple enough. 



DOGMATIC FOUNDATION OF RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION. 73 

is to him he praises it, and his eyes sparkle with admiration. His 
weak voice raises a hynm of praise, at a time when he knows 
neither what will hurt nor what will benefit him."i 

Here we have already a sentje of justice aud a true mo- 
rality. 



CHAPTER HI. 

ON THE EDUCATION AND INSTRUCTION OF THE CHILD THROUGH 
THE TWO FIRST PERIODS OF LIFE. 

ARTICLE I. 

ON RELIGION. 

137. Christianity receives the child into its loving arms 
when he comes into the world, and piously closes his eyes 
when he goes out of it. 

The following dogmas of the Catholic Church ^ are as com- 
forting as they are salutary: 1. Jesus Christ saves men 
through an occult pow^er, which he exercises over their 
minds for then* improvement, and which is called grace; 
2. This grace is attached to certain external rites, of which 
the Catholic Church is the depositary, and which are called 
sacraments ; 3. The first of these sacraments is baptism, 
through wdiich man is regenerated^ — that is, he receives the 
principle of a higher moral, or rather supernatural, life ; 4. 
The Catholic Church, besides the power of administering 
these sacraments, possesses that of blessing things aud 
persons, God adding his own blessing to that of the 
Church, — i.e. his grace and favor; 5. The Church prays 

1 V Education Progressive, L. II. c. ii. It is a fiiie aud true observation of the 
same writer, that the term joli, pretty, with its counterpart ufjiu, are among 
the first words understood and made use of by chikhen. 

2 I beg to refer the reader here to the passage in my Preface stating my dissent 
from the Roman Catholic creed of any author, and recpiest that it may be borne in 
mind as applying equally to all other portions of the work enforcing the doctrines 
or practices of the Church of Rome. — Note of the Translator, 



74 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

in the pra^^ers of its members when the latter, being in 
communion with tlie Church, pray in her spii'it, and such 
prayers are efficacious ; G. God always listens to prayer, 
and receives the offerings of men of good-will. 

These previous dogmas being laid down, it follows that, 
though the child is incapable, during the two first periods of 
life, of himself performing religious acts, it is the office of 
his parents to perform many for him, that they may ob- 
tain from God for their child, already new-born through 
baptism, ever-increasing grace through the benefits and 
means provided on earth for men by the Saviour. 

Religion, then, goes before the child, and does much for 
him ere he can do anything for it. Happy the parents rich 
in faith ! Happy the child to whom such parents are given ! 

AHTICLE II. 

THE ACTS OF THE WILL ARE STBOXGER I>r CHILDHOOD THAN IN ADULT YEAKS. 

138. It is commonW believed that the child's will, like his 
physical nature, is weak, and that as he grows older he 
grows stronger in tlie exercise of his will. 

This view is the result of considering only the free exercise 
of the will, which is entirely deficient in the child, and which, 
when it has once begun, goes on increasing, so that an ever- 
wider circle of things is or may be brought under the do- 
minion uf deliberate action. In the child, on the contrary, 
the will acts spontaneously ; and it is these spontaneous acts 
which we declare to be more powerful — that is, more decided 
and unrestrained — in the child than in the developed man. 
"Desires, affections, pains, pleasures, all are vivid and 
strongly marked in the child. As the various impressions 
and emotions are in themseh^es the main instruments of the 
child's development, so he is endowed with a singular 
eagerness in seeking for and multiplying them unceasingly. 



NATURE OF VOLITION IN INFANCY. 75 

Whatever affords a prospect of them he delights in. If his 
fancy is to go out, he springs towards the door, and the 
mere sight of his hat makes him quiver with joy from head 
to foot. If he is to be taken out in a carriage, he is so 
restlessly impatient that it is no easy matter to hold him. 
Motion, within him and without him, is his delight."^ 

We cannot measure the degree of intensity of the child's 
pleasures or volitions, because the measure of those we feel 
in ourselves is our consciousness, which is not formed in the 
child, and it is extremely difficult for us to understand that 
mysterious condition of a being feeling pleasure and pain 
without any knowledge, any consciousness, of them.^ Never- 
theless, that is the condition of the lower animals, and very 
often that of human feeling also.^ 

139. Now there are two reasons why the feelings and 
affectiA^e volitions of children should be so exceedingly ar- 
dent and impetuous. The first is that, the object of such 
volitions being simple, the will throws itself into them with 
its whole force. I have already oljserved that the will is in 

1 Mad. Neckei" de Saiissiire, L' Education Progressive, L. II. c. iv. 

2 It may be useful to explain here that by "consciousness" Rosmini means the 
act of the intelligence recognizing by reflection our self as doing or suffei'ing. " To 
be conscious," he says, "is to know our act as our own, — that is, to know the act 
and at the same time to know that we are its authors. Now, this knowledge we 
cannot have except by means of another act by which we reflect on what takes 
place within us." (N'eiv Essaij, No. 1391.) The same applies to knowledge of a sen- 
sation as our sensation, and of ourselves as feeling it. It is evident that this knowl- 
edge belongs to a much more advanced stage of intellectual development than is 
included by the author under the first and second periods of childhood. The steps 
liy which it is reached foi-m the subject-matter of later portions of this work. — 
Note of the Translator. 

3 The sagacity of Liebnitz recognized the existence of a sense of pain and 
pleasure without consciousness ; but he restricted this to slight feelings which he 
improperly called insensible. We are of opinion that the sense of pain or pleasure 
may attain any degree of intensity, and yet i-emain entirely separated from con- 
sciousness. This is one of the most important of natural facts, to which, I observe, 
no suflicient attention is paid. Cousin and Galuppi both overlook it, and the latter 
declares the subtle observation of Liebnitz to be absolutely false. See The Phi- 
losophy of the Will, by Bar. Pusipiale Galuppi, Vol. I. p. 1, c. ii. u. 19 ; see also 
New Essay, No. 288 aud foil. 



76 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

its nature infinitely susceptible and mobile : I must here 
add tiiat its power is greatest when it is not divided and 
dispersed on man}^ objects which, by drawing it in opposite 
directions, interfere with and neutralize each other. 

This also gives the reason why the common people act 
with more impetuosity than cultivated persons. I have 
especially observed that peasants, where they feel at all, feel 
with great intensity, be it pleasure or pain. The same 
character of ardent and decided volitions is seen in the na- 
tions of antiquity : they have the same vivid life, enthusiasm,, 
passion, which we find in children. 

140. The second reason of the vivid affections and voli- 
tions of children is, that they tend directly to the object per- 
ceived, while adults conceive the objects in the abstract, and 
make the act of the will pass, as it were, through a long 
series of general ideas before it arrives at the object itself. 
But I reserve till later on the development of this reason, 
which deserves fuller consideration. 

It is true that the first ardent feelings and volitions of 
children are easily changed into contrary ones ; but this 
proves nothing against their intensity, but only that they are 
very mobile, and that the transitory and ephemeral nature of 
their objects, which are for the most part very trifling, does 
not admit of any persistent duration. 

ARTICLE III. 

THE TENDENCY OF EDUCATION IN EARLY CHILDHOOD SHOULD BE RATHER TO 
CULTIVATE FEELING AND VOLITION THAN INTELLECT. 

141. If, then, the feelings and volitions of children have 
a greater force and intensity the less their intellect is de- 
veloped, — the child willing with his whole being, and bend- 
ing all the strength of his will towards a few simple objects, 
— it is manifest that mothers should take advantage of this 
condition of the infant mind, and attend at this early stage 
to tlie training of feeling and will rather than of reason. 



CONDITIONS OF HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT. 77 

142 The mind of the child should be filled betimes with 
that good-will towards others for which Nature has happily 
formed it. This benevolence, this uuiversal affection, sprnigs 
up naturally, as I have pointed out, in the atmosphere of ]oy 
and brightuess which should be maintained as much as 
possible ill the child's mind. , , ., , 

The joyousness of the child should be gentle, habitual, 
serene, not fitful and wild. By preserving his placidity, we 
not only incline his mind to gentleness and benevolence, but 
also favor liis intellectual progress : the latter requires for 
its due and orderly advance the calm and placid condition 
in which alone the child can collect its attention. This 
condition is the more important the more the child is sub- 
ject to the distractions arising from the extreme mobih.y ot 
his organs, feelings, and thoughts. Mad. Necker admirably 
observes that, -when the attention of the child seems cap- 
tivated by any object, care should be taken not to disturb it. 
Whatever interests him becomes an object of observation 
and assists his development."^ 

AUTICLE IV. 

THE ACTIO.. PKODrCEB BV TH. A.niA. FBBLIXGS ABB ^0^^^™ 2-^™ 
,»WS OF nature: THE EAKLIEST VOLITIONS, A>D THE I>TEI,I,ECTnAI, 
"^ZZ CO^EOrEKT WO. THEM,AKE I. THEMSELVES PISCO..ECTEP. 

143 We have descrilied iu the "Anthropology" the 
marvels of the vnitive force in the animal. -of that agent 
^•hich, springing from the unity ot the subject, produces 
effects rivalling those of reason. 

One of the properties of this force is to bring into play 
contemporaneouslv the several powers of the animal, both 
passive and active, and to obtain from them a single result. 
Such are the effects of the instinct of sympathy, of imita- 
tion, and other animal operations, in which the multiple are 

1 De V Education Progressive, L. II. c. in. 



78 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

reduced to unity, the various to an admirable simplicity. 
By this property, all the sensations and motions of the animal 
at each moment are so wonderfully co-ordinated, that he 
feels and does a multiplicity of things which to him are only 
one thing. 

144. Now it is true that the operations of the human un- 
derstanding also are endowed with a certain unity by the 
perfect unity of the sentient, intelligent subject ; it is true 
that the uuitive force presides equally in the domain of 
sense as in that of intelligence, or rather reduces these two 
orders into one, because it is the agent of a subject in whom 
sensation and understanding equally have their origin. But 
there is a wide difference between these operations of the 
animal and those of the intelligent being : the former, having 
arrived at subjective unity, have got all that is possible to 
them ; the latter, on the contrary, require besides objective 
unity, without wdiich they cannot be said to be ordered and 
combined. 

145. The reason of this difference is that the animal order 
has no reference to an object, and, when the operations are 
in unison, all is in unison. But the intellectual order does 
not consist in mere operations, but in the possession of ob- 
jects not only extraneous to the sul)ject, but counterposed to 
it. It is not enough, therefore, that the intellectual opera- 
tions should be unified : the unity required is that of their 
objects ; and these, in the second period of childhood, are 
in themselves entirely unconnected, the child not having yet 
thought of the relations between them by which they are 
bound together and harmonized. 

This observation appears to me to deserve attention as 
capable of throwing no little light on the mode of directing 
the child's education. 



METHOD OF DIRECTING OBSERVATION. 79 

ARTICLE V. 

OBSERVATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS THE CHILD SHOULD BE LED TO MAKE. 

146. The importance of the above observation will be 
seen if we consider in what consists the only instruction 
which can be given in the second period of childhood, and 
which corresponds to the first order of cognitions. 

But, before I treat of this most elementary instruction, I 
must remark, once for all, that, in laying down the kind of 
instruction that should be given to the child as correspond- 
ing to the first degree of intelligence, I do not mean to 
affirm that such instruction should be given only during that 
brief period of life in which cognitions of the first order are 
actually being formed. I desire merely to establish what is 
the instruction which may be safely given at any, even the 
earliest, period of life, because it requires only that the in- 
tellectual faculties should have reached their earliest stage 
of development. This holds good also in the more advanced 
stages. Instruction of any order is always fitted to the age 
above it, and only unfitted to the age below it. 

147. I say, then, that to the disconnected intellectual 
acts or cognitions of the first order correspond observations 
of sensible external things which are equally disconnected, 
being as yet bound together by no process of reasoning. 

Hence the first grade of instruction consists in leading 
the child to use his own senses in the observation of exter- 
nal ol)jects, and in making him experiment on them. Our 
aim in this is a high one. It is, by following Nature herself, 
to train the child to be an observer and exj^erimentalist, — to 
direct his attention agreeably, constantly, and judiciously, 
without ever forcing or disturbing it. 



80 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ARTICLE VI. 

THE EDUCATOR SHOULD REGULATE THE PERCEPTIONS OF THE CHILD. 

148. Nature herself leads the child to observe everything, 
to experiment on everything ; but all these experiments and 
perceptions are unconnected and desultory. The first office 
of the educator, then, consists in regulating the cJiUcVs obser- 
vations and experiments so as to lead Iiim to j^erceive and to 
perfect his perceptions. 

149. Perception^ which is placed by Nature herself as the 
foundation of the whole immense pyramid of human knowl- 
edge, should also be the foundation of all human education. 

Now pe7'cep^ion, as we have already said, is perfected 
in proportion to the number of sensations which the man 
receives from the same object, to the vividness of those 
sensations, their order and their associations, and, above 
all, on the attention he gives to them and to the most minute 
parts of the object perceived (n. 104-120). Here is a vast 
field in which the child should be exercised, and which yet 
does not exceed the first grade of instruction. 

Nature, having prepared this well-ordered material for the 
infant understanding l)y the combinations and connections 
given already in the animal condition, herself teaches the 
educator what he has to do, i. e. to imitate her. 

ARTICLE VII. 

PATIENCE AND SAGACITY REQUIRED BY THE EDUCATOR FOR THIS PURPOSE. 

150. But how great are the patience and good sense de- 
manded of the educator in all this ! He, an adult, must 
apply himself to things which have lost their interest for 
him, though indeed, if he have the right heart and mind, 
he will soon recover a fresh and far larger interest in them. 
This is the gift wanting in the majority of educators ; hence 
the ill-grace with which they bend themselves to join in the 



INSTINCTIVE WISDOM OF CHILDHOOD. 81 

proceedings and experiments of children, too often only 
disturbing them in tlieir worlv of placid observation and 
experiment, — for childish play and movements, and the 
child's delight in them, may all be reduced to observation 
and experiment, — not understanding the wisdom that un- 
derlies them, and trying to turn their pupils' attention to 
other objects, fitted only for adults, in which they them- 
selves find pleasure and consider of importance. This fact 
has often led me to ponder and ask myself why it was that 
the Divine Master never reproved anything in children, but 
rather praised everything in them, while, to the severity of 
human wisdom, that early age seems so full of frivolity and 
devoid of any serious purpose. Not so, apparently, was it 
judged by Jesus Christ. Rather it would seem that in those 
childish exercises he saw something very different from mere 
play and loss of time, — an intense activity of the mind, 
eagerly aspiring to know, to grasp the truth, by wiiich 
Vanima semplicetta cJie sa nulla ("the simple soul, igno- 
rant of all"), though created to know, throws itself impetu- 
ously into the w^orld of sense, to seize, in whatever way it 
can, some intelligible notion of it, ceaselessly observing and 
experimenting on the objects presented to it by the senses.^ 
It behoves us, then, with inexhaustible patience, to follow 
the child in this most serious and continual study of his 
early age, and to help him by regulating it. 

ARTICLE VIII. 

THE ORDER TO BE INTRODUCED IN THE PERCEPTIONS OF THE CHILD. 

151. It is not my purpose to determine here in what order 
sensible objects should l^e brought before the child : it is 

1 What I have said here does not prechide the fact of the original disorder in 
children which makes their will infirm and their sensnal instincts powerful. A 
very little ohservation of them is sufficient to make manifest the truth as regards 
the germ of evil deposited in the new-born child taught in the traditional doctrine 
of Christianity. 



82 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

enough to observe that it will be well to study some order, 
and that from such an order, especially if well chosen and 
used by a judicious teacher to guide the child's perceptions, 
great advantage would be derived in preparing and accel- 
erating his future development.^ I will only touch upon 
some points which may afford, as it seems to me, useful 
indications to sagacious teachers of little children, whether 
men or women. 

152. The first of these is, as much as possible, to make 
the life of the child regular. " When," says Mad. Necker, 
' ' the impressions themselves recur continually in the same 
order, the most painful will in time be softened, and the 
expectation of the pleasant ones will never be deceived. 
To find themselves deceived is felt keenly by children, and 
the source of bitter tears." ^ This regularity of life is of 
the greatest advantage to children throughout their infancy. 

The child should be provided in abundance with objects 
to look at, touch, examine, and experiment upon, — in a 
word, to perceive, and perceive ever more and more accu- 
rately. The objects chosen should be those which most 
attract his attention, which will also l)e those which satisfy 
his wants, his desires, and give him pleasure ; for it is only 
by these that his attention is aroused (97, 98). 

153. It will be found useful also to present to him simple 
objects, following a certain order, — for example, the seven 
colors of the rays of light, one after the other ; also wliite 
and black ; and, still better, the harmonic scale of colors, the 
succession of which will delight him.^ Let him hear, in the 

^ It is precisely this order which Froebel has worked out and carried into prac- 
tice in his Kindergarten system. He and Rosmini, independently and in total 
ignorance of each other, based their prniciples of education on the laws of human 
nature and development ; but Froebel went on to the complete practical applica- 
tion of these principles to the education of children from the cradle upwards. — 
Note of the Translator. 

2 De V Education Progressive, L. II. c. iii. 

* See Anthropokxjy, Nos. 443 and foil. 



ORDER IN PRESENTING OBJECTS. 83 

same way, the seven primary notes, first in succession, then 
by degrees in their harmonic intervals and chords ; then 
give him regular solids to play with, to the proportions of 
which, in form and measurement, his eye and hand may 
become accustomed, at the same time that they impress 
themselves on his imagination. Later on, but not till much 
later, the child may be familiai-ized with more colors, more 
sounds, more forms harmoniously combined, but always ])y 
degrees, and never passing on to a new play till he shows 
weariness of the old. It must be evident that, besides 
other advantages, the reception of so many well-ordered 
images into his mind will l)oth provide fitting material for 
his future reflection, and facilitate the intellectual operations 
he will soon be called upon to undertake, not to mention 
that his mind itself receives a precious moral benefit from 
insensibly conforming itself to order, and being trained to 
the feeling of beauty.^ 

1 The whole series of Froebel's Kimlerj!:arten "Gifts "and ''Occupations" are 
the practical development and application of the above pregnant hints. — Note of 
the Translator, 



SECTION III. 

ON THE SECOND ORDER OF COGNITIONS, AND THE 
CORRESPONDING EDUCATION. 

CHAPTER I. 

THIRD PERIOD OF CHILDHOOD. 

154. The first sign of intelligence in the child is the smile 
which marks the beginning of the second period of his life. 

As the work of the first period of infancy is the awaken- 
ing to life, and bringing into commnnication, through their 
proper stimuli, the infant's own senses with foreign bodies, 
so the work to be accomplished in the second period is, as 
regards the order of sense, to bring into harmony the sensa- 
tions of touch with those of sight, and, in the intellectual 
order, to give the first impulse to the understanding by 
means of perceptions and of imaginal ideas. A child does 
not learn the complete use of his hand, and how to regulate 
its movements with regard to the objects he sees, till he is 
about eight months old ; and he is nearly a j^ear old before 
he tries his first tottering steps and utters his first articulate 
sounds, — both signs of the new period which dawns with 
the second ^^ear of his life. 

155. It is, then, with language that the third period begins. 
To learn the signs of things is indeed a new and great step 
in human intelligence ; the first word which the child under- 
stands and pronounces is an important epoch for the whole 
of life : to this period belong the cognitions of the second 
order. 

Before entering into th^se, I would again remind the 
reader that, as the instruction proper to the first order should 

84 



COGNITION OF PRIMARY RELATIONS. 85 

not cease with the second period of life, but be continued 
progressively, so the instruction proper to the second order, 
altliough belonging to the third period, is always useful and 
often necessary, through all the periods that follow. 

CHAPTER II. 

WHAT ARE THE COGNITIONS OF THE SECOND ORDER. 

ARTICLE I. 
WHAT ARE THE COGNITIONS OF THE SECOND ORDER IN GENERAL. 

156. When the attention of the child fixes itself upon the 
cognitions of the first order, obtained during the first period 
of his life, his thoughts about them are termed cognitions of 
the second order. These cognitions consist in the relations 
perceived to exist between the cognitions of the previous 
order. 

But let it be carefully observed that these relations are 
primary and immediate, and not yet the relations between 
relations. 

In order, then, to know which are the cognitions of the 
second order, we must distinguish carefully the immediate 
relations between the cognitions of the first order from all 
the relations which are afterwards discovered between those 
primitive relations themselves. 

ARTICLE 11. 

TWO KINDS OF COGNITION BEYOND THE REACH OF THE MIND AT A CER- 
TAIN PERIOD OF LIFE, — THE ONE BECAUSE IT IS OF TOO HIGH AN 
ORDER, THE OTHER BECAUSE IT DOES NOT ATTRACT THE ATTENTION, 
WHICH LACKS THE NECESSARY STIMULUS. 

157. We must here observe that the cognitions attained 
in the third period of childhood are not all cognitions of the 
second order ; for, although it is impossible that the child 



86 ON THE RULING PRINCirLE OF METHOD. 

should attain cognitions proper only to a later period, yet 
it is possible that he should attain those proper to a pre- 
ceding one. 

That he cannot have cognitions belonging to a period of 
life still in the future, is as evident as that he cannot reflect 
upon thoughts which he has never had. Hence we see clearly 
why the cognitions of the second order can never be attained 
by the child who is not in possession of those of the first, 
since the former are only his own reflections on the latter. 

We shall understand how the child in his third period is 
able to attain cognitions proper to the preceding one and 
grasp them clearly, if we bear well in mind this principle, 
that ' ' the active powers of man are set in motion only by 
external stimuli, and are exerted just so far as and no far- 
ther than these have power to excite them." It follows that 
the suflflcient reason of each step of intellectual development 
should be sought, not in any supposed activity within the 
child's mind, but in an external impulse. I have shown in 
the " Ideology " that it is an error to imagine that the child 
has within himself a motive-power adequate to produce all 
the acts of which he is capable. Those who hold this view 
do not observe nature, but invert it. The following facts 
will be sufficient to prove how completeh^ gratuitous is their 
assumption. The most powerful of all the faculties set in 
motion in infancy is the imagination. If, then, there were 
any faculty to which independent action could be attributed, 
it would assuredly be this ; but the fact to whicli I allude 
proves the contrary, and constantly demonstrates that the 
childish imagination, so susceptible of impressions, is in- 
capable of inventing anything of itself. "Fortunately," 
says Mad. Necker, "this lively imagination is not creative. 
Children left to themselves may be frightened by a black 
man, a chimney-sweeper, a mask, and remember them with 
terror ; but they seldom make to themselves chimeras. Very 



INCITEMENTS TO INTELLECTUAL ACTIVITY. (S7 

rarely will they dwell upon an idea that has not been sug- 
gested to them." ^ 

158. Now the incitements which arouse the intellectual 
activity in the first period of infancy are no other than the 
primary x>hysical tvcuits, which set in motion the whole activ- 
ity of the human being to endeavor to satisfy them, includ- 
ing the intellectual activity, which then takes that first step 
of which alone it is yet capable. As those wants, however, 
are few, and, once satisfied, demand nothing more, they do 
not spur on the human mind to all the perceptions and im- 
aginations it is capable of, but simply to those that are 
necessary. For instance, the fundamental feeling, and the 
idea of being in general, constitute material for the intel- 
lectual attention which can never be absent ; and yet that 
attention does not fix upon it, and the fundamental feeling 
and the idea of being in general are among the last, and are 
held to be the most difficult, subjects which can occupy the 
human mind. Why is this? Surely not because any one 
thought is in itself more difficult than another, which there 
is nothing to show ; but that man reflects on these matters 
very tardily, Ijecause only very tardily does the stimulus to it 
come to him : for a very long time nothing impels him to it ; 
he feels no want, no desire for it, and never will he make an 
exertion without a sufficient reason. 

159. I have already observed elsewhere ^ that, when man 
reflects on his previous reflections, the act of reflection may 
concern itself with two different things, — either with the 
objects of the preceding reflections, or with the reflections 
themselves, — that is, with the operations of the mind. Every 
cognition, then, presents a double material for succeeding 
reflection, — the objects we have learnt to know, and the 
intellectual acts by which they became known. But, though 

1 De r FAhication Progressive, L. III. c. v. 

2 Trattato della Cosaenza Morale, " Treatise on the Moral Conscience," 
B. I. c. iii. 



88 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

this double material is given to the miud at the same time, 
the reflections which it awakens on the known objects seem 
always to be more easy, and are made much earlier than 
reflections on the processes by which they are known. In 
short, the mind dwells rather on its own knowledge than on 
itself as knowing and its acts of cognition, and, for the 
reason before given, that the motives which impel it to the 
former are earlier and more powerful than those which draw 
its attention to its own operations. 

Thence it follows that the method of teaching will reach 
its perfection only when we have arrived at determining 
accurately what cognitions are proper to each period of 
childhood, because only in that period do we find the 
material of them, together with the sufficient motive neces- 
sary for their attainment ; and what cognitions are proper to 
the different periods, because the motive to attain them is 
then first felt, although their matter may have been possessed 
much earlier. 

160. There are, then, two kinds of development in human 
cognitions. Some are not formed earlier because their 
matter is wanting ; some because, though the matter is 
present, the mind wants the impulse necessary to fix its 
attention upon it. 

Those coonitions of which the matter is wantino; are im- 
possible to be formed. Those to which the impelling motive 
is wanting are not actually impossible, but nevertheless are 
not formed from the absence of inducement. 

161. Hence the method of teaching will be perfect only 
when, 1. The child's understanding shall be required to 
perform only those acts for which the material has been 
previously given to him ; 2. That no such acts shall be 
required of him where the necessary motive is wanting. 

The materials are given successively, and this succession 
constitutes the successive orders of cognitions. The motives 



INCITEMENTS TO SECOND ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 89 

are also given in succession, and it is these that render pos- 
sible the cognitions for which the child already possesses the 
materials. 

162. But let us now return to consider the cognitions of 
the second order, and in the first place let us inquire what 
moves the attention of the human creature towards them, 
premising that there remain a number of cognitions of the 
first order which are not acquired in the first period of life, 
and must ])e acquired in later periods. Hence many of the 
cognitions acquired in the second period by the human mind 
belong to the first order. 

ARTICLE III. 

WHAT IS THE MOTIVE WHICH IMPELS THE CHILD TOWARDS COGNITIONS OF 

THE SECOND ORDER. 

163. Language, whether vocal or composed of signs of 
whatever kind, gives the stimulus which impels and helps 
tlie human mind to attain cognitions of the second order. 

Let us examine the nature of this stimulus. To lead the 
human mind to pass from the first to the second order of 
cognitions, it is not suflicient to fix attention on the first : 
for thinking of the cognitions already attained does not 
bring new cognitions but simply recalls the old, unless the 
thought adds something new to them ; in other words, unless 
it discovers the relations between them which was impossible 
to it in the first order of cognitions. 

Now, language, which the child hears from those around 
him, does precisely this : — 

1. It moves the human understanding to reflect on its first 
cognitions ; and, 2. Through these reflections, to arrive at 
new cognitions, — i. e. those of relation, which bind together 
the things first apprehended ; and in this perception of re- 
lations consists the second order of cognition. 

161. We must briefly iuquhe whence comes this potency 



90 ON THE RULING PRINCirLE OF METHOD. 

of laiii'uai'o. We must beniii by admittiiiij: that man receives 
from Nature a predisposition to speech. Whatever he feels 
gives an impulse to the organs of the voice, so that he, and 
indeed the animal in general, is instinctively impelled to utter 
sounds. But the knowledge which man acquires gives him 
new feelings, and the sounds these impel him to utter form 
the material of language.^ To utter sounds following upon 
feelings is, therefore, a necessity of man's nature, a want 
felt by him, although such sounds are not yet speech, but 
only the materials of speech. 

Another natural predisposition to speech is given to man 
by sympathy and the instinct of imitation,'^ which incline 
him to repeat the sounds ho hears, — an inclination which 
exists, though in lesser degree, in many of the lower animals 
also.^ But to repeat the sounds heard is not to speak, but 
only to execute the material part of speech. 

A third predisposition to language springs from the intel- 
lectual development the child receives in the brief space of 
its second period of life. The iniderstanding has been, as 
we have seen, brought into action by the physical wants 
which invoke its aid, as it were, to satisfy their demands. 
It has answered to the appeal and done all that it could, and 
this all was to perceive^ to generalize,'^ and to icill the things 
perceived. But the wants are continual, and go on demand- 
ing continually the help of the understanding, which is ever 
ready to give it, and now can do more than at first. Even 

1 See the Anthropoloc/y, No. 455 and foil. 

2 Sympathy and the instinct of imitation are straitly bound together in the 
rliild. I have observed that every passive faculty has its corresponding active one : 
sympathy, then, is the passive faculty, whose corresponding activity is the instinct 
of imitation. The latter has been explahied in the Anthropology, No. 487 and foil. 

3 Daniel Ikirrington. \ioe-l*resident of the Koyal Sot-iety, Lonilon, has proved 
by various experiments that the song of birds is only the repetition of what they 
hear, and that, if a young bird is taken from the nest and placed with l)irds of 
another species, it learns the song of its new companions. — See Philosophical 
Transactions, Vol. XV., and the Journal de Physique, Juin, 1774. 

* Generalization is the faculty of the imaginal ideas. 



STIMULUS AFFORDED BY LANGUAGE. 91 

in his purely animal condition, man, through the synthetic^ 
force, seeks to help himself through whatever is at hand, 
things (jr persons, that are to him sources of sensation. 
His intellectual attention, thus turned to all sensible things 
around him in order to make use of them, fixes also upon 
the language he hears, which at first is nothing moie to him 
than a series of sensations reaching him through his hear- 
ing. But he very soon discovers that he can derive greater 
advantages from the use and interchange of these sounds, 
and tlu'ough them get himself obeyed — that is, helped — by 
the persons around him, and he gives his whole attention to 
learning how to use them so as to attain his ends. 

In this manner, language becomes a fresh stimulus, occa- 
sion, and assistance to the child's intellectual attention. 

ARTICLE IV. 

THE TWO KINDS OF COGNITION TO WHICH LANGUAGE IMPELS THE CHILD'S 

INTELLIGENCE. 

165. Let us see now what are the new cognitions to which 
the child advances b}' means of the language he hears, and 
which he learns from those around him.^ 

These cognitions are of two kinds. Some are cognitions 
of the first order, which the child could not attain earlier 
because the necessary stimulus was w^anting to rouse his 
attention to them. Others are cognitions of the second 
order, which he could not attain earlier, Ijecause not only the 
impulse but the matter of them was wanting. 

ARTICLE V. 
WHAT ARE THE COGNITIONS GAINED BY THE CHILD THROUGH LANGUAGE. 

IGG. The child, by means of the tinitive force, first con- 
nects the sensation which he receives from hearing a name 

1 The marvellous operation of this force has already been explained in the 
• Anthropolofpj, Xos. 458-483. 

- I allude here only to vocal language. The reader can appl>' juy remarks to 
all language, such as signs, — those, for example, used for the deaf and dumb. 



92 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OP METHOD. 

pronounced with the object that name signifies,^ so that the 
sound of the name immediateh^ recalls to him his perception, 
of the object, or its idea in his imagination. 

This fact demonstrates that language must give the child 
a greater aptitude for recalling the memory and idea of 
things.'-^ Without this help of language, he could recall them 
only b}^ their falling again under his senses, or Ir^ some 
accidental motion of the fibres of his brain ; with it, the 
sound of a word, or the recollection of it, brings back to 
him the memory and the idea of objects. Language thus 
becomes to him a sort of artificial memory^ and serves to 
increase his use of the faculty of recollection. 

167. Absent things, then, which could only be recalled to 
the child's mind ])y accident, are easily recalled by the use 
of lanouao;e, and it would seem that onlv bv that use could 
he form the conception of the absence of things. For his 
recollection of perceptions shows him things in the time and 
place in which he perceived them, and therefore as present ; 
the imaginal ideas ^ show him the thing as possible ; but 

1 The union in one feeling of the visible perception with the sound causes the 
child wlien he receives the former to utter the latter, because, 1. The object per- 
ceived; 2. The sound; and, 3. The act of pronouncing the sound, become to him in- 
separable things. Mad. Necker rightly observes: " The child, in pronouncing his 
first words, takes pleasure in exercising a special faculty. If he sees a dog pass in 
the street he utters its name, as he has arrived at learning it, but he has no other 
motive in the utterance than the pleasure he takes in it. He is moved neither by 
fear nor hope. If he were afraid of the dog, he would cry; if he wanted it, he 
would throw himself towards it Avith cries of imiiatience; but he only names it 
in a state of perfect calm." {V Education Proyress'we, L. II. c. ii.) The reason 
of the fact observed by Mad. Necker is that the child pronounces the word dog so 
soon as he sees the dog, to complete in himself the one feeling composed of the 
three elements above mentioned, as I have explained at length in the Anthro- 
pology. 

2 " Children," observes Miss Edgeworth, " help themselves, by certain move- 
ments, to recall the ideas they acquired in association with those movements." This 
subtle observation shows afresh how Nature herself inclines the child to connect 
ideas with sensible things, and proves the existence of the unitive force pointed out 
by me in both animals and man. 

3 Rosmini uses the term " imaginal ideas" to denote the images produced in the 
mind of things actually seen. There will, therefore, be as many imaginal ideas 
as there have been things seen. — Note of the Translator. 



STIMULUS AFFORDED BY LANGUAGE, CONTINUED. 93 

laugimge teaches him, in addition, that the thing he had per- 
ceived still exists though it l^e not present. He becomes 
aware that a thing can exist, whether it be present to his 
senses or not, in a place where it does not fall under his 
senses. This is already a great step for him to have taken, 
since by this operation of his mind he perceives that the 
Bu])stance of the object is, not its action upon him, but 
something that subsists, although not felt by him.^ 

This step also impels the mind towards the knowledge of 
invisible things. 

Moreover, as the number of absent things is infinitely 
greater than that of present ones, if we consider language 
under this aspect only, we see that it opens a way for the 
child to more than double his first acquisitions of knowledge. 

ARTICLE VI. 

WHAT ARE THE COGNITIONS OF THE SECOND ORDER GIVEN TO THE CHILD 

THROUGH LANGUAGE. 

168. A still greater step is taken when, by the help of 
language, the child passes to cognitions of the second order. 
To trace how this takes place, and ascertain the different 
kinds of cognition of the second order, we must analyze the 
process by which the child arrives at expressing his cogni- 
tions in words. 

In the first instance, the word is only a sensation which he 
connects with certain images through the second function of 
the wiitive force,^ whence with the recurrence of the sensa- 
tion recur also to his mind the associated images. After- 
wards the process is reversed, and the child having previously 
the image and the sound, when the sensation which corre- 
sponds to the image is revived he is carried on to complete 

1 The absent object is not, however, conceived without any relation to sense. 
See Prlncipii della Scienza Morale, "Principles of Moral Science," ch. ii. 

- This second function is that of " associating sensations and images." See the 
Anthropology, No. 463 and folL 



94 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

it by pronouncing the sound which forms its other part, in 
virtue of the fourtli function of the unitive force. -^ 

In the third place, the child, who gets help thro gh his 
cries, blends into one the active feeling of his cry and the 
passive sensation of the help it brings, and thus he uses it 
instinctively, the cry becoming to liim one with the pleasant 
sensations which immediately follow it, — a union effected in 
every animal by the above-mentioned fourth function of the 
unitive force. 

In these three processes the animal nature alone is brought 
into play. 

169. Let us now go on to consider speech as the stimulus 
to intellectual processes. 

The spoken word is a sensation which ver}^ soon becomes 
associated with the intellectual 2:)erception in presence of 
which it is uttered, and serves to sharpen attention and 
make the perception more vivid. At this stage the word is 
a part of the complex perception itself, — that is, of a percep- 
tion accompanied by several sensations. Here intelligence 
comes into play, but as yet it is only that of the second 
order ; the word is perceived only as a sensible element of 
the perception. 

Words are at first connected with the memory of 2^ercep- 
tio7is, and serve, as we have seen, to recall the thought of 
absent objects which have been perceived : this still brings 
into play onl}^ the first grade of intelligence, but at a more 
advanced stage. The word here is a sensciUon^ which recalls 
a perception in which the word itself has no part, and soon 
becomes in addition a perception which recalls another per- 
ception. 

In the second place, the word is associated with imaginal 

1 The fourth function of the unitive force is that of "forming one single 
feeling out of several feelings partly passive, partly active." See the Anthro- 
pology, No. 479 and foil. 



ASSOCIATIONS INDUCED BY WORDS. 95 

ideas, aud thus serves to recall the latter. In this case, the 
word is a sensation and also a perception, which impels the 
child to turn his attention to the associated idea, and that so 
rapidly and simultaneously that he seems to see the idea in 
the word the moment he hears the latter. 

The words which recall to the mind either past perceptions 
or imaginal ideas cannot be said to impel the understanding 
to the reflections which constitute a new order of cognitions, 
but only to those in which the understanding reviews its cog- 
nitions of the previous order. It is true that, as a relation 
exists between the word and the imaginal idea or the memory 
of the past perceptions, that relation belongs to cognitions 
of the second order, which we have defined to be " cogni- 
tions having for their object the relations between cognitions 
of the first order." But it should be observed that the word 
may recall to us the imaginal idea without our conceiving 
intellectually the relation between it and the idea : it is 
enough that there should be a physicial nexus causing the 
attention, so soon as it is struck by the sound, to turn to 
the idea. 

170. There is yet a third process which the word induces 
in the mind, without, however, forming in the latter cogni- 
tions of the second order. The process of which I speak 
resembles abstraction in its effects, but is not abstraction, 
though leading to it almost immediately. AYhen the child 
hears a word used as a name for several similar things, — for 
instance, " horse," each time that such an animal passes, — he 
does not at once abstract the common qualities of the horse 
(which yet he is capable of remembering) ; but he believes 
that the horse then passing is the same as the one he saw 
before and heard named "horse," because he has not yet 
observed the difference between the one he sees and the 
one he has seen. The word recalls to him the perception, 
together with the imaginal idea of the horse seen before, and 



96 ON THE IIULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which he takes to be the same.^ Unless, therefore, we care- 
full}^ examine what is passing in the mind of the child when, 
each time that a horse passes, he pronounces the word 
" horse," we shall assume that he has already abstracted the 
species horse from the individual horse. In this, however, 
we should err until we have ascertained that the child had 
taken notice of some differences between the horses he has 
seen successively, by which he has learnt that the one is not 
identical with the other, but that both the one and the other 
are horses^ — i. e. that both have something in which they are 
alike, and therefore have a like name.'-^ 

§ 1. — Abstractions formed immediately from sensible things. 

171. We have found that words fulfil three functions be- 
fore producing by their use cognitions of the second order. 

1 Here again comes into play the unitive force, not of the mere sensitive subject 
only, but of the sensitive intelligent subject. The work of M. Maine de Biran, 
entitled Lnfluence de V Habitude sur la Faculte de Penser, will assist us here. The 
author observes with justice that a quality which vividly strikes the child may 
become "such an haliitual sign as to carry with it mechanicaUy the apparition of 
all associated impressions or qualities." I, however, should not say mechanicaUy, 
but in accordance with the laws proper to the animal. On this first effect of habit 
is foiuided, according to Maine de Biran, " the prompt and natural conversion of 
individual names into general words and terms." 

2 The inclination and the faculty to revive in imagination the images formerly 
seen are always somewhat difficult to explain. The difficulty in this fact, which 
takes place completely within the limits of the animal nature, consists m this, that 
the images revived are not numerically the same as the past ones, but only equiva- 
lent to them. How, then, can the animal tend towards the revival of jjast images? 
The answer must surely be that the former images have left a certain trace in the 
animal retentiveness, and that the inclination to revive them resolves itself into 
the inclination to complete the trace thus left. This presupposes the law we have 
pointed out elsewhere, that a pleasurable state of the animal, when it has passed 
away, leaves an inclmation towards an equivalent state. But, agam, tliis state, 
though eqxiivalent to the first, is not numerically the first : how, then, can there be 
a tendency to a new state, or how can the animal feel the equivalence between two 
states luimerically distinct? To throw light on this mystery, we must fall back on 
the doctrine regarding the identity of the animal and his fundamental feeling at 
different times, — a doctrine which manifestly establishes that the animal principle 
is altogether outside the laws of time, to which only its modifications are subject. 
This is a matter worthy of meditation by the profoundest metaphysicians. See the 
AnthropolfKji] , No. 303 and foil., and 789 and foil. 



USE OF WOllDS TO FORM ABSTRACTIONS. 97 

To produce these, and principally abstraction, is their fouith 
office, which must l)e carefully analyzed. 

Only proper names as accepted by mankind are signs of 
perceptions, or of the memory of former perceptions : all 
other words are signs of universals. Nevertheless, the 
demonstrative pronouns this, tJiat, etc., joined to the com- 
mon name, apply or restrict it to signif}^ perceptions, — i. e. 
real objects perceived. 

If we examine the rest of the words besides proper names 
of which language is composed, we shall not find a single one 
intended or applicable to signify imaginal ideas. When, 
therefore, we said that one of the first uses the child makes 
of words is to recall such ideas to his mind, we spoke only 
of the childish use, differing from that of a later age, because 
the child does not yet know the value of the common use of 
the word. 

172. That this is the case will appear manifest if we 
observe how absolutely useless it would be to invent words 
to express imaginal ideas. For the latter are infinite, and 
differ from each other by distinctions so minute that it is 
of no importance to men to note them, and would, on the 
contrary, be a great hindrance to quickness of thought or 
speech. In the first place, the perceptions of a thing vary 
in the man himself according as he perceives more or less 
of it; and as the perceptions so also will the images vary, 
and the imaginal ideas which rest on the images. It would, 
therefore, be impossible to have a word for each of these 
ideas. In the second place, such ideas vary in different men ; 
hence, if a man wanted to express by a word his own imaginal 
idea, he could not be sure of being understood by others 
who have not that particular idea. In the third place, it is 
enough to consider what Plato says, ^' that every real and 
finite thing is continually undergoing change, destruction, and 
regeneration." Take, for example, a horse : he is changing 



98 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

every hour he lives ; he most, then, excite a new imaginal 
idea. It would be enough that a single patch of his coat 
should turn gray, or his ears grow the tenth of an inch in 
length, to make a new name necessary for his type, for the 
complete idea of him. It is, then, impossible for words to 
signify such imaginal or complete ideas, although the child, 
who has perhaps no others in his mind, revives them by 
the sound of the words through the analogy they have with 
the abstract ideas which the words are used to express by 
mankind in general. 

173. The. full idea not being signified by words, it remains 
unobserved, and philosophers themselves jump from percep)- 
tions to abstract ideas without attending to the full ideas 
which stand between, as we have pointed out.^ 

We must, then, bear in mind that language contains not 
a single word (except proper names, demonstrative pronouns, 
and certain adverbs of time and place) which does not ex- 
press an abstract iclea.^ In talking to a child, then, we are 
continually drawing the attention, not to a universcd only, 
but to an ahstraction ; and it is this operation, perfectly new 
to him, which leads him to cognitions of the second order, 
and which we must investigate with the greatest care. 

When the child hears the house-dog called "dog" again and 
again, and hears it equally called a "dog" when small and 

1 Neii'^ Essay, No. 761 and foil. Let those who pretend that the natural prog- 
ress of the human mind is, step by step, from the particular to the general, duly 
consider this fact. The imaginal ideas, which are the earliest and the nearest to 
the particular perceptions, do not in any degree arrest the intellectual attention 
of man, who passes on directly to abstract ideas, which alone he exiiresses in 
words and alone makes the object of his discourse. This fact might disabuse all 
bona fide sensationists if they observed it properly. I do not know a single modern 
philosopher who has recognized the universality of imaginal ideas, and, when I 
have succeeded in making any one aware of their existence, he has rejoiced over 
it as a discovery. Plato, among the ancients, seems to have been aware of them, 
and I have used this conjecture to interpret some passages of his concerning 
species which seem to me inexplicable without it. 

2 It is necessary always to bear in mind the difference ])etween abstraction and 
generalization, of which we have spoken in the New Essay, No. 490 and foil. 



FIRST PROCESS OF ABSTRACTION. 99 

lapping milk and when grown bigger and eating bread, when 
it has its ears and tail and when both are cut off, and hears 
this one word " dog " applied to all the street-dogs, whether 
large or small, rough or smooth, standing still or running, 
quiet or angr}^, there comes a time when his mind lixes upon 
the one thing for which that common name of "dog" is 
given to all. In other words, by dint of hearing the same 
term applied so diversely, he abstracts that which forms 
the common element in dogs (the dog-nature) , and uses that 
common element (which is an abstraction) as the mark to 
distinguish the objects to which the name "dog" should be 
given. 

174. Not that the child can yet account to himself for this 
mental process, or that he has formed any just conception of 
the distinctive note of dogs. His mind has worked to that 
point without his reflecting upon it, and has formed a con- 
ception of some kind of what distinguishes the species dog 
from other species of animals, or at least of that which he 
believes to be the distinction between them. 

The mistakes he may have fallen into regarding the dis- 
tinctive note of the dog in no way affect the truth of what 
we have been saying, nor alter the fact that he has really 
gone through the mental process of abstraction, although the 
element he has abstracted does not exist, or exists only in 
his imagination, or is not the element which constitutes the 
nature of the dog. Indeed, the child never begins by ab- 
stracting precisely the element to which, ])y connnon usage, 
the word is affixed, but always abstracts a yet more common 
or generic element.^ 

1 It is said that Prince Lee Boo of the Pelew Islands, having come to Macao and 
seen a horse, innnediately called it a dog, an animal already known to him. This 
fact demonstrates that he comprehended horses in the species dog, — i. e. that he 
attributed the term do(j to several species, to a whole genus. His mistake must 
have been quickly corrected, whether l)y himself through attending to the immense 
differences between dogs and horses, and thus seeing that, for the convenience of 



100 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

The child corrects the mistake he has fallen into, when the 
discovery of new differences between things makes him per- 
ceive that he has given to a word a wider meaning than other 
people : he then restricts the meaning, at the same time re- 
stricting the abstraction he had expressed by it, and thus 
determining its characteristic or abstract element more pre- 
cisely, reducing it from the general to the specific, or from 
a larger to a smaller genus. 

175. We must, therefore, assure ourselves that the child 
has arrived in the use of words at recognizing that there is 
an element common to several things, and that he adopts 
that element, whatever it be, as the sign by which the things 
to which the word is applicable are distinguished. Then 
only can he be said to have performed the first process of 
abstraction, which forms the cognitions of the second order. 

speech, it was necessary to invent two names as signs of these two species, instead 
of having one name whicli was only tlie sign of a genus ; or wlietlier (which was the 
easier way) tliis reflection was suggested to liini by others, teacliing him that they 
reserved the word doy to signify one species, and horse to signify another, and the 
name quadrtqyed, or a similar one, to signify the genus. A similar error of excessive 
abstraction is that pointed out by Cook, and referred to by me in the Xeic Essay, 
n. 155. Now this same tact observed in savages is observable also in children when 
learning to speak. They always err by attributing to words too general a meanuig, 
because their minds are naturally more inclined to the general than the specific. 
" I have seen," says Mad. Necker de Saussure, " a child who called all fruit — plums, 
cherries, currants, grapes, etc. — alike apricots; another gave the same name to 
two little girls dressed alike." {De V Education Progressive, L.. II. c. vi.) I have 
observed the same thing in a little girl, and referred to it in the Restoration of 
Philosophy , etc., B. II. c. xxxi. Some think they can explain this fact by attrib- 
uting it to the poverty of language in the child and the savage ; and undoubtedly 
it does spring from poverty of language. But why should this poverty determine 
the mind to attribute to known words a generic signification rather than to invent 
a new word, or at least to acknowledge ignoi-ance of the name of that new thing ? 
"Why does the mind tend to believe that, with the few words it possesses, it can sig- 
nify all things, instead of taking them rather as words expressing a few individual, 
or at any rate, specific thmgs? Does not tliis fact make it clear that it is the nat- 
ural tendency of the mind which leads it to put into the meaning of words the 
widest generic conception it can ? Certainly it could not see in them a very gen- 
eral conception if the multitude of words forced upon it the nmltitude of specific 
differences in things. The mental processes, then, of those who have a poor vocab- 
ulary, show that in man the indeterminate and general precedes the less general 
and better determined. 



USE OF COMMON NAMES. 101 

If several horses are present, and he gives to them all the 
name horse, it is certain that he has arrived at this ab- 
straction, for he cannot take the one animal for the other. 

If he gives the same name to things superficially presented 
to him, but which are utterly unlike,^it is ecpially certain that 
his mind has arrived at abstracting ; for it is not possi))le 
that he should take one of them for the other, and Ijelieve 
those different things to be one and the same thing : he rec- 
ognizes, then, the plurality of individuals, and yet the iden- 
tity of some one thing in all which induces him to give them 
the same name. 

In the same way, the plural names given to things show 
that his mind has arrived at the process of abstraction.^ 

176. In that wonderful operation, then, to which the 
mind is impelled by its need of understanding, and in which 
it is assisted by the contemporaneous sound of the word 
"dog," for instance, and the presence of dogs, and by the 
action of the speakers, the child proceeds as follows : — 

( 1 ) In the multitude of imaginal ideas which he has formed 
in seeing and hearing so many and such different dogs, subject 
to so many modifications (each different dog correspond- 
ing to an imaginal idea), he altogether neglects the differ- 

1 Reid also gives it as a sign by which to recognize that the chikl has arrived at 
forming abstractions when it speaks of having two brothers or two sisters. " From 
the instant," he says, " that it uses the phiral, it must have general ideas, since no 
individual has a plural." (Essay on the Intellectual Poivers of Man, c. v.) These 
latter words prove that Reid did not understand the real cause of the phenomenon, 
and that he confounds the collective with the abstract. The individual cannot be 
collective, cannot be i)lural ; but may be abstract, may be universal. When I 
say man or a man, I speak of an abstract and universal individual. My reason, then, 
for adducing the use of the plural, jxs a sign tliat the child has arrived at abstrac 
tion, differs from Reid's. I hold that the iise of the plural, by one who expresses 
and understands it, is a sign of the power of abstraction, not because he expresses 
by it a collection of individuals, but because it includes the observation that tlu 
one individual is not the other individual, and yet that the same name is suitable tc 
both, which is as much as to say that it expresses a common characteristic. Henoe 
those who differ from the Scotch philosopher on this poiixt leave my view un 
touched. 



102 ON THE RULING rRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ences, and concentrates his attention on the hkeness com- 
mon to them all. 

(2) This common element having become the exclusive 
object of his thought, he uses it as a sign by which to rec- 
ognize the object he has to remember every time he hears 
the word " dog." ^ 

111 . And let it be noted that he does not connect the 
sound dog with that element only, but with all the objects in 
which he recognizes that element. 

That element has been abstracted in the child's mind, but 
is not yet named. The w^ord dog does not indicate only that 
abstraction, but includes all the objects in which that ab- 
straction resides : it cannot be understood unless the mind 
has formed the iibstraction which it presupposes and by 
which it is determined, and yet " dog" is not an abstract but 
a common name. 

Hence it appears that abstractions assume two forms in 
the mind, — the one unnamed ., which is the foundation of the 
common name ; the other named by means of abstract names. 
To use the word ivldte substantively is to use a common 

1 I have again and again affirmed that the attention of the human mind, which 
does not act of itself, hut only when excited from without, would never fix itself 
on an abstract quality of objects without the help of words, which the child gets 
from the society in the midst of which lie lives. It follows that man could not have 
invented that part of language which expresses abstractions, — by far the larger 
part of it and very nearly the whole. I have supported this assertion by arguments 
which I believe to be irrefvitable. But the experiments I have made on children 
have furnished me with a new one, and these experiments are corroborated by a 
mother who is also a sagacious and diligent observer. I mean Mad. Necker de 
Saussure. She attests the following most true observation: "As it is too often said 
that languages have sprung from wants, and are ordy perfected cries, I am in a 
position to certify that, at least as regards children, this is not the case. I will 
add that the child does not invent words, but only repeats, as best he can, those he 
hears spoken. Neither does he call an annual to him by his cries, uidess the ex- 
ample has been set to him. Hence spoken language, in its most unformed stage, 
is the result of imitation and teaching, and always seems to have something of 
a foreign origin." {L' Education Progressive, T. I., L. II. c. ii.) This single ob- 
servation made on the child disposes of all the romances of Bonnet, Condillac, 
Soave, and others, relating the imaginary story of the two infants lost in a forest 
and composing a language. 



ABSTRACTION OF ACCIDENTAL QUALITIES. 103 

name, because the substantive white means onl}^ "a white 
object" : the Avhiteness is united to the o])ject ; but the mind 
has the abstract idea of whiteness, and uses it to understand 
the word white. To say tvhiteness is to use an abstract name 
expressing only that precise quaUty of the object considered 
by itself, and having no reference to the object in which 
whiteness is seen. 

The term tvhite is, therefore, earlier understood by the 
child than tvhiteness, although he learns to understand the 
second very soon after the first. But before he can under- 
stand the second his mind must have gone through another 
process. In the term tvhite, an abstraction has been made ; 
but it is united to the object (although always abstracted 
from it) ; in the term ivhiteness, the abstraction is entirely 
divided from the object, and has itself become a mental ob- 
ject directly expressed by the word. When we say ivhite, we 
express an object which, besides ivhiteness, has other qualities, 
to which we are not giving special attention, but which we 
know to be there generally, and which nmst be there for 
the object to subsist ; when we say whiteness, that single 
quality excludes every other thought from the mind. White- 
ness, then, expresses a mode of abstraction more complete 
than the substantive ichite. 

178. The abstraction maybe of an accidental, quality in 
a thing, such as ivhiteness; or it may be of the substance 
of the thing, such as body. Sometimes the abstract term is 
wanting in a language, and onh^ the common name exists ; 
as, for instance, we have the term do<j, but not that of dog- 
ness. The want of these abstract terms proves that they are 
of later date than common names. 

There are other proofs to show that abstract terms were 
invented later than common names, such as that supplied ])v 
etymology ; in fact, every abstract term seems derived from 
a common one, as ivhiteness, for instance, from white. 



104 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

We find another proof of what we are affirming in the most 
ancient writers. The language they use is an exact reflec- 
tion of the degree of mental development in their times, and 
we may directly infer the latter from the former. The an- 
cient Oriental writers, like the Greek philosophers, and 
specially Plato, use the common name as a substantive to 
express the abstract : they sa,y the like, the unlike, the just, 
the beautiful, the holy, etc., for likeness, unlikeyiess, justice, 
beauty, holiness, etc.-^ It is evident that the former were 
first in use, and that, as mental power developed and the 
need was felt of expressing the abstract apart from any 
concrete, instead of inventing new words the old ones were 
adapted to the purpose ; according to the constant law that, 
as nations advance in mental development and their primitive 
lanouaoes cease to suffice for their wants, before coinino- new 
words, they set themselves to alter and extend the meaning 
of the old ones.^ 

§ 2. — First classification of sensible things. 

179. When the child, then, has formed to himself an 
abstraction, he has laid the basis of a classification to which 
he can refer objects. Thus, for example, when he has formed 

1 These names are used as the titles of several of Plato's Dialogues. 

2 Latin literature exhibits a people more advanced in the use of language, by the 
more frequent use of abstract terms. The word pulcritudo, for example, is fre- 
quently used by Cicero where Plato only uses the beautiful, to KaKov. The Latins--, 
on the contrary, use the word jndcrum, with great propriety reservmg it almost 
exclusively for the sentence pulcriun est, which always refers to a particular thing, 
as, for example, Chii 2)ulcrum fait in medios dormire dies (Horat.,Bk. L,Ep. II., 
V. 30). It may be observed that in the Holy Scriptures, to indicate the abstract in 
Hebrew, the plural of the common name is used, — for instance, Sj^n-itus Deorum 
(Daniel iv. 15) for the Divuie Spirit ; the Hohj, or the Holy of Holies (Ps. cl. 1, Lev. 
xiv. 13), — that is, the Itohj things, — to express holiness. 

This mode of expression reveals the mental condition of a people who, having 
arrived at abstracting the common element in things and inventing common names, 
have begun to feel the vv;vnt of a name expressing directly and accurately the 
abstract itself. The first step to this end is that of adapting the common name in 
an abstract sense, as, for instance, Sanctum for Sanctilas, Afterwards they take 



PKOCESS OF CLASSIFICATION. 105 

the idea of that which is common to all tlie objects called 
dogs, on seeing one of these objects he immediately refers it 
ttj the class dog. Before making the abstraction he could 
not have made the classification. 

Classification, then, is a meutal process which follows upon 
abstraction, on which it is founded, and therefore belongs to 
a higher order of cognitions than the second, of which we 
are speaking, to which belongs only abstraction. 

180. But if we look more closely into the matter we shall 
find that there are certain primary classifications which are 
made simultaneous!}^ with the abstractions, and by one and 
the same act of the mind. They^ are uot distinct, but implicit. 
When the mind perceives, through the repetition of the word 
dog, that there is a common element in all the different dogs 
seen, it accomplishes two things, — (1) It observes the com- 
mon element in all these objects ; and, (2) It abstracts it, 
using it as the sign of that class of objects named dogs. 
To recognize this common element in several objects is, in 
fact, itself a classification, which is completed by assigning 
to them a common name. 

However true, then, it may be that the man wdio has 
formed abstractions, when he sees a new object and refers it 

a second step, and, seeing that the common name Sanctum does not adequately ex- 
press the abstractio? . Jiolhicss, — because, as a common name, it only indicates one 
holy thing at a time, while the abstract (holiness) is a single element existing identi- 
cally m many things, — they strive to expi'ess that abstract which they tind equally 
in many things, by using for it the common name made plural, as in Sancta, 
SciHcta Sancforum. The common name is founded on an abstract of action, or 
referrmg to action, — for example, the moving, the stable; hence, when they passed 
on to express the abstract as one word, such common names were changed into 
the infinitives of verbs expressing the abstract action or passion of things. These 
infinitives were, later on, used to signify the abstract itself, not as an act, but, so 
to speak, as a state. For instance, the infinitive "llOi?, which signifies jirmum esse, 
is used also to express firnniess, jirmitas. And not only in Greek is the infini- 
tive contiiuially used in the form of a noun (and in fact it is a noiui), but in 
Italian it is in common and very freque^ use, which it was not among the Latins, 
as, for example, I'essere, U far delle cose, Pujularc, it venire, etc. (the being, the 
douig of things, the going, the coming). 



106 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. ' 

to a class, performs another mental operation, later in time 
and of a higher order than the abstractions themselves which 
give him the basis of the classification, yet it cannot be denied 
that in the process of abstraction there is something that 
resembles classification. 

§ 3. — Integration. 

181. The knowledge of the existence of God also belongs 
to the second order of cognitions. 

In that order, however, God. is known only as the neces- 
sary complement of being, and as the cause of all, by a 
faculty of the mind which we have termed integration. 

It is incredible with what ease and quickness our minds 
perceive that whatever comes under the senses is contingent^ 
and cannot exist without a something necessary whence it 
takes it origin. Few, indeed, are those who can explicitly 
account for this sudden upward step of the mind,^ but none 
the less is it real ; all peoples, in all periods of their history, 
have recognized the necessary existence of a God, — that is, 
of a necessary unity, first cause of all, — as self-manifest. 
The most idiotic of men sees this truth as evident : he seeks 
no reason for it ; his persuasion is immediate, and he would 
wonder at any one who should ask him to account for his 
belief, and possibly laugh at or ridicule him as a fool or 

1 The reason of the extreme difficulty of accounting for this natural and simple 
conclusion is that it rests on the idea of the absolute, and on the principle of abso- 
luteness into which that idea is transnnited. Now the idea of absoluteness is one of 
those we have termed Elementary Ideas of Being {Xeir Essay, Xo. 575), which are 
within the reach of all men to make use of, but are most difficult to seize by the 
intellectual attention for the purpose of contemplating: and fixinp; tliem. W^e have 
and use them from the beginning as means of knowledge {jwincipium quo); but it is 
only when the mind is developed by the exercise of philosophical investigation that 
they become objects of our knowledge {principium, quod). Beimj, in the intuition we 
have of it by nature, has a necessary order : that necessity, by which we see that no 
entity can exist without the order intrinsic to all entities, leads us to see manifestly 
that the contingent entity could not exist ^mless there were a necessary entity. 
From our cognitions of the former, tlien, we deduce the existence of the latter, 
although it does not fall luider our senses. 



RECOGNITION OF GOD'S EXISTENCE. 107 

a tritler. This is wliy children so easily understand the 
word "God" as signifying a Supreme Being, the cause of 
all, and give their assent so readily when his existence is 
affirmed. 

182. And this ready assent by children is not to be taken 
as a gratuitous belief in the word of those who make the affir- 
mation. They do not, in this case, believe blindly : they 
see. If it were otherwise, they would at least wonder 
greatly at the conception of God, when the attempt was 
made to impress it upon them ; nor would it fiud that easy 
and natural acceptance with them which causes them, so 
soon as they are able to conceive it, to believe that God 
exists. 

Yet without language children could not perceive this 
Divine existence. God being invisible, they could not fix the 
conception of him without a word to arrest their attention 
upon it. 

But what is the knowledge of God in children? It is 
both a conceiMon and a belief: I say belief, to distinguish it 
from 2^^^ce2^tion. When man judges that a thing exists, 
because he feels its action upon himself, he has the i^erception 
of it. When he judges that a thing exists without feeling- 
its action on himself, but on certain grounds of reason, he 
believes in it. 

CHAPTER HI. 

DEVELOPMENT OF THE ACTIVE FACULTIES IN THE THIRD PERIOD 

OF CHILDHOOD. 

183. To the passive faculties correspond an equal number 
of active faculties.^ 

When, therefore, we have accurately defined the nature 
and extent of the development of the senses and intelligence 

1 Anthropology, No. 48. 



108 ON THE IIULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

during a giveu period of the child's life, we can infer the 
nature and extent of instinct and will in the same period. 

Important as it is to know the degree of development of 
the passive faculties, in order to measure and adapt to it the 
instruction to be given to the child, still more important is it 
to know the degree of development of the active faculties ; 
for without this knowledge we shall be powerless to adapt 
and guide his jj.''<:(cfiea7 education, in which we can make use 
only of those activities which have ah-eady been awakened 
and set in motion within him.^ 

184. Now, in this third period of life, the child, through 
the means of language, of wants and instincts newly awak- 
ened in consequence of his development through the two 
previous periods, — 

(1) Adds immensely to his stock of perceptions, memories 
of perceptions, and imaginal ideas. To this corresponds an 
equal development of his instincts and affective and apprecia- 
tive volitions. 

(2) At all ages, man can conceive absent things. This 
causes the passion of desire. It is true that, even as regards 
present things, we may feel the desire to enjoy them, if they 
are oood : but it seems to me probable that the desire to 
enjoy things that are present comes very late to man, — 
appetite and natural instinct, which inclines the animal to 
them, supplying its place. The memory of past perception 
is not properly a conception of absent objects, and primi- 
tively can excite only a certain feeling of annoyance that the 
perception is past, but not a desire, because such a feeling 
alone would not awaken the thought that the perception 
could be renewed ; whereas, on the contrary, if the thought 
of a pleasurable absent object is excited, it is immediately 

1 On the manner in which human activity gradually awakens and becomes 
effective, something has been said in the work entitled La Societa e il suo fine, 
" Society and its End," B. IV. Ti. 



HOW ACTIVITY OF WILL IS EXCITED. 109 

followed by a spontaneous action of the will desiring it. 
The third period of childhood is, then, marked l)y the birth 
of desire.^ 

(;>) But a greater activity of the will is excited in virtue 
of the earliest aljstractions. As the understanding fixes its 
attention exclusively on an element common to several ob- 
jects, so, if this element is pleasant, the will desires it ; if it 
be unpleasant, it abhors it. Now, the difference is immense 
between the volitions which have for their object an actually 
existing individual, such as it is, or even a full-species of 
individuals,^ and the volitions the object of which is an ele- 
ment common to man}^ individuals, an abstraction. In the 
first case, the will loves an object which is good (bonum) ; 
in the second, it loves that which makes the objects good 
(rationem honi) , the goodness in them. The volitions which 
have for their term only a determinate object which is good 
are satisfied by its possession, and therefore their effective 
action quickly ceases. On the contrary, the volitions which 
have for their term a connnon element, which gives their 
goodness to that kind of objects, do not find their satisfac- 
tion in this term, which is an abstraction incapable of appeas- 
ing them, but use this abstraction, which was their first term, 
as a sign by which to recognize what objects are good, and 
to discern them from the bad. Here, then, the activity of 
the will finds an immense field for its development, because 
this element of goodness which it desires is realized in an 
infinit}^ of objects which man, arrived at this point, goes 
incessantly in search of. Hence it is that, as I have shown 
elsewhere, the faculty of abstraction is that which furnishes 
man with the rules by which he discerns and finds that which 
is good.^ 

1 This full-species is, as we have said, that which is founded on a completely 
definite concei)tion, or one that answers to an imaginal idea. 

2 See La Societd e il auojine, '• Society and its End," B. IV. c. xxiii. 



110 ON THE PtULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

(4) Among the earliest abstractions, we find quantity in 
sensible objects, whether as continuous or intensive. It is by 
means of this abstraction that the child discerns the greater 
from the less,^ — that, for example, which gives him more, 
from that which gives him less, pleasure. 

This cognizance of the quantity of things awakens in him 
a new class of volitions, — i.e. the cqypredative volitions,'-^ 
and the power of choice which begins at that age.^ 

(5) Another of the primary abstractions made by the 
child from things, and most important to his development, 
is that of animated being (animalita) . 

1 Even the sensual instinct acts as if it could discern the more and the less ; but, 
when an animal seizes the larger of two morsels of food, or the one it likes best, it 
is not because it discerns the greater from the less, but by a law of its own nature, 
the effects of which resemble those of iutelligence, as we have explained at length 
in the Anthropvlogij, No. 430 and foil. 

2 See the Antln'opolofjij, No. G19. 

•'' As regards discrete quantity, I believe that the child, aiTived only at the second 
order of cognitions, camaot coiuit beyond two, because to combine two objects is 
already a reflection, and to put together three presupposes the reflection that first 
combined the two, so that each addition of a unity seems to be a reflection on the 
preceding additions. It may be objected to this opinion of mine, that the senses 
themselves present many objects simultaneously to the child, and therefore that 
his intelligence grasps them at one glance. But this fact, however true, does not 
seem to me sufficient to enable him to nimiber the objects, or to form true collec- 
tions of them, because the human mind does not form a collection until it has, 1st. 
Perceived each object ; 2d. Distuiguished the one from the other ; 3d. Compared 
them together, joiued them by some word. This is not done by sense, which only 
feels several things, but does not Icnoio that they are several. It is always of 
the utmost importance to distinguish carefully feeling from Wiowing. With re- 
gard to my classmg the knowledge of continuous quantity under the second order 
of cognitions, it might be objected that man does not, in his earliest perceptions, 
affinn more than the entity {entlta) of the thing ; its mode of existence is only 
felt by him (No. 109-112). It is, then, by a second act that the mind perceives the 
absolute quantity of a body, and by a third that it compai-es the absolute quantity of 
two bodies and finds their relative quantity, — that is, the greater and the less, which 
are words expressing relations. I confess that this difficulty requires consideration. 
Nevertheless, it has not induced me to change my view of the perceptions of gi-eat 
and small, as belonging to the second order of cognitions, because the perception 
of absolute quality, although posterior to the earliest perceptions, and an advance 
upon them, is still only a perception, and therefore does not exceed the first order 
of cognitions. To know that one object is large and another small presupposes 
only the confrontation of two objects at once, and two objects can thus be con- 
fronted, as we have said, by the second grade of cognitions. 



RECOGNITION OF ANIMATE LIFE. Ill 

If lie could reflect on his own feelings and thoughts, he 
would have an immediate perception of his own soul, which 
would be a cognition of the first order, and therefore more 
elementary than that which he has of soul as the cause of 
motion in animated l)eings. But, altliough the soul-feeling 
(l^anima-sentimento) is the object of a cognition of the first 
order, such a cognition is as yet beyond the child, because 
the stimulus is wanting to draw liis attention to his own feel- 
ings and arrest it there. His attention is like a child always 
running away from home ; the objects of his wants and his 
external sensations, amongst which are the sounds of words, 
draw it from within to the world without. 

Nor would he arrive at arguing, from motion in animals, 
to the existence of a principle of motion in the animal, if 
language did not teach him to attend to a part instead of 
the whole of a thing, and from the complex to abstract its 
element. Thus, in the animal, he can think, by means of 
language, the character of mobility, and make the abstrac- 
tion animate being, or the animal. This is what enables him 
to distinguish not only a great and a little in things, but also 
a difference of digmty ; he can already, in his practical judg- 
ment, estimate animate ol)jects higher than inanimate, and 
prefer the former to the latter, as the greater entities. 

(6) Finally, the cognition of the existence of God, as 
complement of tlie entities, exalts the activity of his feelings 
to the most sublime of ol^jects, and places him already in 
communication with Heaven. 



112 ON THE liULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 



CHAPTER IV. 

OF THE TEACHING CORRESPONDING TO THE SECOND ORDER OP 

COGNITIONS. 

ARTICLE I. 

FOUR ERRORS TO BE AVOIDED BY TEACHERS. 

185. To the child, every new idea is a joy : his intelligence 
rushes in at every door opened to it. As the first act of 
intelligence parts the lips of the infant with a smile, so its 
delight in the sound of the mother's words shows itself by 
exulting motions ; and, as soon as it can itself pronounce 
words, the difficulty is to keep it silent. It is going against 
nature to deprive the child of the use of speech, which is 
equivalent to him to the newly acquired use of his intelli- 
gence, the best part of himself. The teacher should avail 
himself of this innate and noblest impulse, not repressing 
it, — which is an offence against the divine light shining in 
the human soul, — but wisely employing and guiding it. 
This, however, is a most difficult art. 

186. The errors made in this direction may be reduced to 
four : — 

(1) Sometimes the intellectual activity of the child be- 
comes annoying and troublesome, and an attempt is made 
to repress it by authority, refusing it sufficient food. 

(2) Sometimes the material memory of the child is bur- 
dened, while his intelligence is left to starve, — which is not 
only a most serious injury to the little, intelligent creature, 
who craves only to understand, but also cruel and inhuman. 

(3) Sometimes the intelligence is given food not adapted 
to it ; in other words, it is called upon to perform acts of a 
higher order than it has yet attained to, — in which case, to 
understand anything beyond mere words is an absolute 



ORDER TO BE OBSERVED. 113 

impossibility. Sometimes the cognitions required of it are 
not beyond its powers, but tlie intellectual attention lacks 
the necessary- stimulus to make the effort to attain them. 

(1) Finally, even when all the cognitions required of the 
childish intelligence are proposed to it in their due order, 
and accompanied by the appropriate stimuli, there is failure, 
because the teacher passes from one thing to another, with- 
out having assured himself that the first thing was duly 
understood, and that the child is really following the suc- 
cessive steps of the teaching ; in other words, he does not 
give the child time to take in the matter, to master it, and 
to recover from the kind of surprise which every new idea 
produces in him. 

The preceding observations should be borne in mind at 
the beginning of each of the following chapters, in wdiich 
we shall treat of the teaching of children at the several 
periods, or rather at each of the successive periods of their 
childhood, as marked by each order of cognitions. But 
how easy it is to forget them ! 

ARTICLE II. 

THE GAIN TO THE MI^'T> FROM THE REGULARITY WITH WHICH PERCEPTIONS 
AND IMAGINAL IDEAS HAVE BEEN IMPARTED IN THE PRECEDING PERIOD. 

187. We come now to the teaching which should be given 
to the child as corresponding with the second grade of cog- 
nitions. But let us first note that the child does not, at 
that age, reap all the fruit which will follow from that or- 
derly presentation to the mind of perceptions and cognitions 
recommended by us (Nos. 178-181). Yet some good result 
is obtained both on the mind and life of the child, though it 
is diflflcult to trace it. 

In man there is a subjective unity, — that is, an ultimate 
unity of feeling. Thus, every sensation, perception, or idea 



114 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

produces a certain effect, good or bad, on this ultimate feel- 
ing. It follows that, whenever the sensations, perceptions, 
and ideas are well harmonized, the fundamental being of man 
is improved ; all of them acting upon it together, to produce 
a single effect, which belongs to the order of the cause 
whence it springs. Hence, although the child is as yet 
iy-norant of this order in its sensations and cognitions, yet, 
by a law of its constitution, it reaps the benefit of it. 

ARTICLE III. 

MATTER OF INSTRUCTION, —LANGUAGE. 

Section 1. — The child should he taught to name the greatest possible number of 

things. 

188. The matter of instruction fitted to this third period 
of childhood is given by the stage of intelligence which we 
have examined and described. 

It results that the first thing to be taught at that age is 
language. It will therefore be a great gain to the child 
to learn at that age to name as many objects as possible, 
and to speak correctly within the limits of his knowledge. 
This used to be entirely neglected, but the admirable in- 
vention of infant schools gives us better hopes for the 
future. I also rejoice to see that books are now being 
written for the purpose of teaching children to name things 
properly. Among these it will suffice to mention the manual 
of Vitale Rosi,^ already quoted.^ 

Section 2. — Limits of this instruction. 

189. The teaching of language to the child must, of 
course, be limited by its knowledge, — that is, 'by the condi- 
tion of its intelligence. The words used to him in the third 

1 Fuligno, Tomassini, 1832. 

2 Rosmiiii would have rejoiced still more had he become acquainted witli Froe- 
bel's Kinderoavten system, in which the accurate use of language, from the very 
beginning, i)lays an important i)art. — Note of the Translator. 



EXERCISES IN THE USE OF LANGUAGE. 115 

period of wliieli we are treating sliould express eognitioiis 
of the first and seeond order, but no more. 

Language, the nature of which is to express all degrees 
of cognition, is the most fitting instrument for the develop- 
ment of intelligence at every period of human life ; but one 
portion of it only is suited and proportioned t(>> the tiiird 
period, and that alone should be used with the child at this 
time, because that alone can be intelligible to him, and any- 
thing more would simply load his memory, while leaving his 
understanding a acant and sterile. This would be to commit 
the third and fourth errors pointed out above. 

Let the child, then, learn to name his own perceptions, 
and the abstractions which are derived immediately from 
sensi))le oljjects, absent things, those which are invisible, 
and the conceptions he has derived from his faculty of 
integration. 

190. It is certain that from this period the child can learn 
two or three languages by ear, without any great effort. If 
this is done by making his mother tongue the principal one, 
and using what he learns of the others as equivalents super- 
added to it, the exercise in these languages will be a gain of 
time, a step in advance made by the child. -^ 

Section 3. — Double jjractice in language, — the natural and artificial. 

191. Language should be taught to children by both a 
natural and artijidal practice of it. 

In the natural practice, every part of speech may be used, 

1 The authoress of L'Essai sur V Education de I'Enfance gives the same advice. 
" Les enfants," she says, " peuvent sans inconvenient apprendre simultanement 
deux ou trois lanirues, surtoutqaand ils sent entoures des I'origiue de persoimes qui 
en font usa<re avec eux. Cela se pratique avec succes chez les peuples du nord, oil 
les enfants parlent des le berceau pliisieurs idiomes differents. Ce nioyen, le seul 
praticable dans la premiere enfance, n'offre pas, il est vrai, I'avantage de former 
I'esprit coiiniic une etude faite par principes ; mais rien ne s'oppose a ce que 
I'enfant entreprenne un pen plus tard ce dernier genre de travail, qui lui sera 
rendu plus facile alors par les connaissances qu'il aura doja acquises. D'aillcnrs 
si une lacune a lieu a cet egard, on pent y supplier par I'etude approfondie de la 



116 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

— not one being above the second stage of human intelli- 
gence, with the exception of certain of the conjunctions, — 
because all may be used to express feelings, perceptions, 
abstractions of the first degree, and the moods of the mind. 

Feelings are expressed by interjections, which are not, 
properly speaking, signs. 

Perceptions are expressed by proper names, by adverbs of 
time and place, by the personal pronouns /, tlwu^ etc. ; and 
demonstrative pronouns, this^ tJiat, etc. Al)stractions are 
expressed by all other nouns, by the infinitive of verbs, by 
participles, and by certain conjunctions. 

The moods of the mind are indicated by the inflections of 
verbs, b}^ prepositions, and by certain conjunctions. 

192. The natural practice of language should follow these 
rules : — 

(1) Nothing should be said to the child which goes beyond 
the stage of development his intelligence has arrived at. 

(2) He should hear only the best language, well-chosen 
and accurate words, a refined accent, and, above all, correct 
proniuiciation. 

(3) The persons who speak to children should convey 
to them, by tone and manner, the sense of moral elevation. 
Were this done, the children would gain innnensely in time ; 
for not only would their intelligence be more rapidly devel- 
oped, but the foundations of moral good results would be 
laid at the same time. 

193. In Italy, precious time is lost by our having to un- 

langue maternelle, de toutes la plus essentielle a savoir bien et k parler con-ecte- 
ment." The facility with which children learning two languages at once avoid 
confusing them is a singular fact, which, however, is to be explained by means of 
the unitive force springing from the perfect unity of the subject. Mad. Necker 
says, admirably as usual : " Sounds are linked together and come back to our 
minds like images ; thus, one word recalling all the other words which accompa- 
nied it, tlie different idioms are not mixed up by children in their talk. The dan- 
ger of any confusion will be more easily avoided if the same person always speaks 
to the child the same language. The idea of the person being then connected 
with a certain mode of speech, the child will use the same iu answering." {De 
V Education Progressive, L. II. c. vi.) 



BENEFITS OF A NATIONAL LANGUAGE. 117 

learn at school the dialect we learned at Ikmiic ; and, even 
after having done this, we do not learn to speak good 
Italian, partly becanse we cannot rid ourselves of the lower 
vernacular familiar to us from childhood, and partly ])ecause 
our masters themselves, to whom pure Italian is an acquired 
art and a dialect is natural, cannot give us what they have 
not got. Correct pronunciation alone takes a very long time 
to learn ; and yet we might have it living in our ears, if we 
had been accustomed from infancy to hear the double letters 
properly sounded by those around us. 

By language we form our ideas, and the perfection of 
language is the perfection of thought. 

Moreover, whatever brings us order and propriety, and 
assists us to think with ease and correctness, tends to moral 
training of a most precious kind. 

Finally, how great would be the advantage to this beau- 
tiful region, if Italy came to have only one speech ! How 
many divisions amongst her people would not that alone 
cause to disappear ! How far greater would be our sense of 
brotherhood ! How would the love of our common country 
increase ! ^ 

These things make me marvel that in our great families, 
where the children are to be given the best education, care 
is not taken to make them imbibe, as it were with mother's 
milk, a pure and refined speech, and their infant ears be 
allowed to hear only good things spoken in good language. 

§ 4. — Continuation. — Artificial practice. 

194. This should be the privilege of the rich : not to dis- 
dain for their children the use of public schools, but to send 
them there better trained, more developed, than others, and 
already in possession of the language the latter have to 

1 The unity of Italy under one monarchy is rapidly realizing Rosmini's patriotic 
wish. A common country necessitates a common language.— xVofe of the Translator. 



118 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

labor at learning. How justly, then, would the wisdom of 
the parents, joined to their means, obtain the first place in 
the schools for their cliildren ! And the latter would have 
time to spare to learn a multitude of useful things which 
would enable them to hold their vantage-ground in relation 
to their school-fellows. 

A word as to the artificial exercise of speech for children : 
it should, at that age, besides correcting the clyld whenever 
he uses a wrong expression, consist solely in givhig him, as 
much as possible, the materials of speech. The forms he 
is not yet competent to learn, for the forms of speech, that 
is, grammar, require an order of cognitions far above the 
second. 

195. But as to the material, he must be taught to name 
everything accurately ; first those things nearest to him, 
then the more distant. He will thus acquire an ample 
A^ocabulary, and thereby great ease and propriety of speech, 
which is as much as to say, of thought, and in time also of 
writing. 

The "Manual of Preparatory Schools" and other books 
composed for this purpose will be found very useful to- 
wards it. 

This is the time for exercising the child in distinguishing 
by then* names all the things that fall under his senses. 
Names (nouns) constitute the fundamental part of language, 
and the exercises must not include verbs, except their infini- 
tives and j^cfytidj^les, which are truly nouns, the former signi- 
fying actions, the latter agents.-^ 

1 " II est vrai," says Mad. Necker, " que plusieurs mots qui sont des verbes 
pour nous n'en sout pas toujours pour eux; aiiisi d boire,c'est de Vcau ou d\i lait; 
promener, c'est le ijJeiii air ou la 2)orte. Mais quaud ils conimencent a vouloir qu'on 
agisse en consequence de ces mots, Taction prend de plus en plus de la consistance 
dans leur esprit et ils finissent par y attacher veritablement un signe." — De 
V Education Progressive, L. II. c. VI. The more ancient a language is the more it 
abounds in mfinitives and participles which replace many other forms of verbs. 
For example, in Hebrew, the third person of the perfect tense is no other than 



ORDER TO BE FOLLOWED IN ABSTRACTIONS. 119 

196. Tliis is the fitting place to say something of the 
order whicli the mind of the child should be induced to 
follow in abstraction. 

There are many unnamed a])stractions. To these the 
child's attention should not be directed because it cannot be 
assisted by words, and the fact that they have no names is a 
manifest sign that mankind have not felt the want of nam- 
ing them, as it is also a sign that they are not among the 
things which fall under our observation. 

But there are several kinds of abstractions among those 
that are named : some are abstractions from abstractions ; 
these are beyond the child's intelligence, which has reached 
only the primary abstractions : he could never understand 
the meaning of the words laiu^ justice^ etc. The abstrac- 
tions he can understand are those only which are supplied 
by sensible things. But even these have various common 
names indicating various degrees of abstraction. The most 
common names indicate things by the element common to 
the largest number of objects, and the less common names 
indicate the same things by an element common to fewer 
objects. The latter, therefore, express a higher degree of 
abstraction than the former. For instance, if I want to 
name a horse, I may name him in three different ways, say- 
ing, "that thing," "that animal," "that horse." I use 
three names which can be equally well applied to the object ; 
but when I call it tiling, I give it a name common to a larger 
number of ol^jects than when I call it animal; and in using 
the latter I apply a name more common than that of liorse. 

the infinitive of the verb, as ?p£), inspicere, is used to signify respexit. In the 
same v?ay, the participle, with the verb to be understood, takes the place of other 
forms. In Kings iii. 15, where the Vnlgate translates ministrabat, the Hebrew 
says 7\~\\i!'3, niinistraus, or was ministeriiiff. And, in fact, in the scale of cogni- 
tions, the noun stands lower than the verb; hence the 'n{fi)iifire and the parficij>/e 
which are really nouns must necessarily abound in primitive languages, when the 
uitclligence of men is in its earliest stage of development, and the other verbpl 
forms requiring greater abstraction come later into use. 



120 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

And yet the name liorse is still a common and not a proper 
name : it indicates an abstraction which is founded on the 
abstract sjjecies, under which there is another or several oth- 
ers (the full imperfect species) not named before we come 
to proper names, such as Roudello, Vigliantino, Brigliadoro.^ 

197. Now let us inquire whether, in the artificial exercise 
of speech imposed on the child, it is most in accordance 
with the order of nature to make him name things by the 
most common names, and afterwards by the less common, or 
vice versa. 

On this point we have already given our opinion (45- 
50) and will here only support and explain it by some 
further observations. But first let it be noted that we are 
not now speaking of the natural exercise of speech, in which 
the only order to be followed is that of the wants which cir- 
cumstances require to be expressed. Secondly, it must be 
remembered that the mor.e common the name is, and there- 
fore the more general the idea it expresses, the easier it is 
for the child to learn. 

To convince ourselves of this, we need only observe how 
children and the vulgar, that is, the least developed classes 
of mankind, always give to objects the widest common 
name, such as this tJmig, that thing, etc., instead of this 
plaything, that cart, that jacket, etc. In the ancient lan- 
guages, the use of generic rather than specific terms is more 
frequent than with us, precisely because the ancient world 
was less developed than the modern. Observe in the Latin, 

1 Although objects are never called by a name intjjcating their fuU imperfect 
species, which embraces all accidental qualities, yet they occasionally receive 
names which partly indicate tlie abstract species and partly accidents. Thus the 
names given to horses, such as bay, chestnut, dapple, roan, black, sorrel, piebakl, 
from the color of their coats, are names given to a species not wholly abstract, but 
distinguished by some accidental quality ; the word roan, for instance, standing 
between the name horse (abstract species) and RondeUo, the proper name of an 
existing individual. There are an infinite lunnber of these specific denominations, 
and they are true common names, partly universal and partly also abstract. 



USE OF GENERAL AND SPECIFIC TERMS. 121 

for instance, the use made of the word res: it was applied 
to everything.^ 

Another observation leads us to the same conclnsion. 
Why is purity of st34e so rare and so highly valued, but 
because it is so difficult to name things by the words signify- 
ing the more limited species, which are habitually named 
loosely under generic terms. 

198. It will, perhaps, be said that children find it easier 
to learn and apply the more general common names because 
they apply to a larger number of objects, and are, therefore, 
more frequently heard. But the question still remains, why 
adults themselves should make such frequent use of generic 
names if it were easier for them to use the specific ones, 
which certainly are more appropriate, and help correctness 
of language. 

It is certain, then, that the more ideas are general the 
more congenial and familiar they are to the human mind, 
provided they express only immediate abstractions, that is, 
such as denote a common element in the sensible things 
perceived by us. The case would be changed if the abstrac- 
tions were such as are formed b}^ an action of the mind on 
previous abstractions, and which we have termed abstractions 
from abstractions.^ 

It is, then, of the greatest advantage to the child to prac- 



1 Torcelliui says on the word res: Vox est immensa prope usus ad omnia sir/niji- 
eanda, quae, fieri, did, aut cogitari possxmt. These observations are, in fact, a fresh 
proof of tlie faults of our pliilosophical system: thing, or res, is a word equivalent 
(with little difference) to entity, being. The words which are most frequently used 
show that the ideas they express are the most famihar and natui'al to man. This 
would be impossible as regards the idea of entity, the most abstract of all, if it had 
to be foimed by dint of successive abstractions, instead of springing into life simul- 
taneously with the human mind itself. 

- If this important distinction is attended to, we shall not be accused of contra- 
dicting ourselves when we assert that the first of the natural-moral laws appre- 
hended by the mind assume a specific form, and only later a more generic and 
universal one. See Trattato delta Coscienza Morale {" Treatise on the Moral 
Conscience "), Nos. 150-166. 



122 



ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 



tise liim in passing from the more general names of things 
to the less general. When he has gone throngh this process 
repeatedly with many different kinds of things, his ideas will 
be arranged in their right order ; he will liave laid in the 
fittest material for subsequent reflection, and his mind be- 
comes accurate and logical. 

199. But besides observing the rules given above, there 
are certain others, of which the following is an example : 
The educator should have a table drawn up of the classes 
more or less extensive into which all the things conceived 
can be divided. This should be the foundation of his logic. 
Here is such a table : 



Universal . 



Categories . 



Genera 



[ Being*. 

[ Elementary ideas of being. 

f Ideal Being. 
Real Being. 
Moral Being. 

r Real Genera. 
< Mental Genera. 
[ Nominal Genera. 



Species . . 



Subsisting . 



^ 



Ahstract Specief!. 
Senii-ahstract Species. 

"1 Full-imperfect species. 
Full Species. > Full-perfect species.^ 

J Ideal. 



In the exercises above mentioned should be included 



1 This scheme has the form proper to the cognitions having individuals for 
their object (the real, universal, and abstracted). By the side of this there should 
be another having the form proper to cognitions wliich have for their object the 
abstractions themselves. This second form, has the same sulidivisions except the 
subsisting, which is altogether wanting; but the word e7ifity should take the place 
of being, and the same in all the other conceptions included ui the scheme. 



CHOICE OF NAMES TO BE TAUGHT. 126 

neither the DJiines sigiiif3'ing the elementary ideas of l)eing 
(thongh amongst tlie easiest) , nor those indicating catego- 
ries, or denoting mental or Nominal genera, bnt solely the 
words signifying the universal, the real genera, the abstract 
and semi-abstract species, and also the subsisting (proper 
names) . 

200. Now, as the semi- abstract species may be innumera- 
ble, we have still to find the rule by which to choose those 
best suited to the child. Here there can l)e no doul)t that 
the right rule is to choose those in which he will be most 
interested, and he is most interested in those which are most 
closely related to his wants and instincts, and which soonest 
and most vividly strike his external senses. 

The educator, therefore, must examine with subtle insight 
the development of these wants and instincts in the child, 
and the order and vividness of his sensations, in order to 
discover which are the accidental qualities in things which 
most interest him, and thus lead him on by this natural gra- 
dation to recognize in each thing the semi-abstract species. 

Moreover, we must remember that these semi-abstractions 
should not be formed from the things themselves, but from 
the conceptions of things as formed in the child's own mind ; 
otherwise he will understand nothing. Now the concep- 
tions the child forms to himself of things are in themselves 
accurate (he makes mistakes only in the words he applies 
to them), Ijut imperfect, and therefore they are continually 
l>eing altered and corrected. For example : the child forms 
his conceptions of a plant from seeing it growing in the 
ground, from its green color, from the common form of 
plants, from the cool, damp feeling of the leaves, etc. This 
is not and cannot be expected to be the conception of the 
philosopher ; bnt it is this childish conception, or rather this 
conception proper to the age in which it is formed, that we 
should start from, and connect with it the classification of 



124 ON THE IIULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

plants. The specific abstraction of a plant in the minds of 
our little pupil will then be "that which is planted in the 
ground and grows." * 

The specific abstraction of the plant itself will, on the 
other hand, be to the mind of the philosopher "an organized 
body without senses or contractility, which develops from 
a germ, absorl)ing and assimilating, under given favorable 
external conditions, molecules of a different kind." The 
classification of plants to which the child's mind should be 
led must in no case rest upon this definition, which the 
child could not understand, but must be constructed on the 
conception proper to his degree of intelligence. 

Hence it would be a blunder to classify plants for him b}' 
seedino- and g-ermination. He does not want a classification 
of that which germinates, l)ut of that irhich is planted in the 
ground and groivs. 

201. Moreover, the abstract qualities on which the vari- 
ous classes are founded must be such as do not exceed 
the degree of intelligence the child's mind has attained, and 
they should also furnish the stimulus wliich shall rouse and 
attract his attention ; this being the second condition, as we 
have pointed out, of his understanding what we want to 
teach. That stimulus is to be found in the sensible char- 
acters of the object, and especially the larger and more 
striking, so that they imprint themselves on his senses, on 
his imagination, and his memory. These characters, con- 
sisting in sensible qualities, bring the full conception {uni- 
versal, not abstract) nearer to the abstract coyicejition, and 
thus form the semi-abstractions, as we have called them, 
which are best adapted to the childish mind. 

The whole classification of roses, which we gave as an ex- 
ample (21-34), is founded on these semi-abstractions; in 
other words, it is an a1)strnction the ground-idea of which is 
a specific semi-abstract idea (the specific idea of the rose). 



ORDEll OF CLASSIFICATION. 125 

202. Indeed, if we consider all the classifications that can 
be made of non-sensitive things, — which is as much as to 
say all physical systems,-^ we find them founded on a 
specific abstract idea, that is, the idea of corporeal sub- 
stance. All the infinite scale of subdivisions of this sub- 
stance is no other than a scale of semi-abstract ideas, which 
descends to the first step, the full idea (idea of the universal 
but not abstract individual) , which is the boundary of the 
ideal world. Wholly outside of that remains the subsistence 
of things, which constitutes the world of reality. 

The conclusion from this is, that the order to be observed 
in teaching the child the more or less common names of 
things, must follow the classification which descends from 
the specific abstract idea, through the semi-abstract ideas, 
to the actually subsisting. 

CHAPTER V. 

EDUCATION OF THE ACTIVE FACULTIES IN THE THIRD PERIOD 

OF CHILDHOOD. 

ARTICLE I. 

DIFFICULTY OF DETERMINING WHICH SHOULD BE THE NEGATIVE AND WHICH 
THE POSITIVE PART OF EDUCATION. 

203. One of the difficulties which the educator has to 
solve is to determine which are the things in each of the 
periods of childhood which the child should do for himself, 
and which should be done for him by the teacher. Undoubt- 
edly the child's nature acts beneficially, and the educator 
should respect this action, and beware of interrupting or 
disturbing it. It is no easy task to discern it and the wis- 
dom of its ends ; and it is only the few who feel how relig- 
iously it should be respected. We are always wanting to 
do too much ; we form opinions with presumptuous haste ; 
and, strong iu our self-confidence, we fancy we can easily 



126 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

do better than nature, and think with a schoohnaster's rod 
to teach and improve our great mother. 

Nature, working in the child, is forever producing peace, 
serenity, order, due development of all the faculties. The 
educator often enough fails in producing these results of 
which nature has the secret, and by his positive action pro- 
duces their contraries, i. e. agitation, disturbance, disorder, 
perplexity, confusion in the mental processes which hinder 
and clash with one another. 

204. This important consideration supplies us with cer- 
tain general rules of infant education : here are some which, 
although I have mentioned them already, can never be too 
often repeated. 

(1) The child should not be disturbed when it is quiet 
and contented. 

(2) In order to avoid the chance of irritation, it should 
be occupied rather with things than persons, for the former 
are never indiscreet, and do not, by their interference, alter 
and disturb the child's natural mode of action. 

(3) When it is tired of things, then is the time for per- 
sons to come to its assistance. 

(4) The persons who are about the child should be sin- 
cerely genial and kind.^ 

(5) They should not excite the child either physically or 
morally by over-fondling or play ; it is better for him to be 
left to amuse himself, with passive rather than active things. 

I am not sure that the rule in English nurseries, of 
always speaking low to children, is a good one.^ The low 
voice is, of course, less exciting, but it seems to me that it 

1 "Rien n'egale," observes Mad. Necker, "la froideur des enfants pour les 
demonstrations hypocrites." — L. II. c. iii. 

2 Note of Translator. — Does such a rule exist? Is it not rather the rule Ros- 
mini himself would lay down, that loud, harsh sounds must be avoided in speak- 
ing to infants? He may have gained the idea from the naturally quieter demeanor 
and lower tone of voice of English people, as compared with Italians. 



EDUCATION I'OSITIVE AND NEGATIVE. 127 

is an excessive application of the principle that the child 
should not be startled or shocked, and that it is an attempt 
to go beyond Nature herself in this matter. On the other 
hand, I hold it to be of the highest use to observe the fol- 
lowino; rule : Let the child hear only sweet, well-modulated 
voices, with a good intonation, nnd then it will not matter if 
they be high or low. Its own voice is high-toned by nature ; 
why should it be injured by the high tones of another? It 
is the harsh, the dry, the false, the discordant, the violent 
which disturbs, distracts, and irritates it, not the natural, 
ordinary sounds, high or low. On the contrary, I believe it 
to be a useful practice for the child, as I said before, to let 
it hear the whole scale of sounds and their concords in due 
order. 

ARTICLE II. 

DIFFICULTY OF DETERMINING HOW MUCH THE TEACHEK SHOULD GIVE THE 
CHILD AND HOW MUCH HE SHOULD REQUIRE FROM HIM. 

205. It need scarcely be said that education cannot be 
altogether negative : the teacher must make it positive in 
some directions. 

In the first place, all but those who choose to flatter 
human nature must recognize that it is defective, and often 
enough manifests evil inclinations. The will of man yields, 
at first, spontaneously to the natural disposition, good or 
evil, which shows that it also is a mixture of both. 

Undoubtedly art must come in to remed}^ the defects of 
nature and will ; to anticipate them, to keep away tempta- 
tion and bring about occasions of right action. Divine provi- 
dence, by ordering that man should be born into a society, 
made him dependent upon his fellow-creatures, that they 
might help his weakness, guide his ignoi'ance, correct his 
wrong tendencies. Education, therefore, nuist have its posi- 
tive side ; but what does that consist of ? How far does it 



128 ON THE RULING TRINCIPLT: OF METHOD. 

extend? What is its part at each period of man's life? 
These are new problems of immense ditliculty to be resolved, 
— problems which in practice will receive infinitely various 
solutions according to the circumstances of tlie pupil, which 
are themselves difficult to know completely and certainly. 

20G. It may be laid down in general, that the positive 
portion of intellectual and moral education should be least in 
the earliest period of infancy, and go on enlarging with each 
successive period ; but what is the law which governs this 
continual extension? In a w^ord, what are its limits at each 
period? The answer to these questions must be arrived at 
by manifold experiments and observations, — which are now, 
thank Heaven ! beginning to be made, — and it is high time 
that the art of experiment and observation should be applied 
to education. Meanwhile, we must be content to point out 
the way, — more than that we frankly confess ourselves 
unable to do, — and shall liegin liy laying down a self- 
evident principle on which our subsequent reasonnig will be 
based. 

This self-evident principle is, that w^e cannot require from 
the child what is impossible to him, but only what he can 
do. We must find out, then, what it is he can do at each 
stage of life : this is the difficult point to determine. 

M. Naville admitted that here was the knot of the whole 
question as regards the education of the child's intellectual 
faculties ; ^ but the case is the same as regards his active 
and moral faculties. We must always know what we can 
exact from the loill of the child ; to require more than this is 
unfair to him. 

1 " Here lies the difficulty: to distinguish accurately what should be given to 
the child and what demanded from him ; and here also lies the merit of the 
teacher, and the condition of his success. If you teach your pupil what he could 
find out for himself by a fair expenditure of time and labor, you dull bis intellect; 
if you refuse to give him the facts needful to him, and guidance in using them 
properly, you hinder his first steps, oblige him to lose time in fruitless efforts, and 
discourage him." -De l' Education Publigue, pp. lOG, 107. 



MISTAKES OF TEACHERS. 129 

207. Now, as regards the understaiuliiig, the ver}' ol)ject 
of this work is to determine with precision the gradual 
processes of the child's mind, so as to know what can be 
expected of it at each period of childhood. The will follows 
the steps of the understanding, and it would l)e manifestW 
unreasonable to require that the child should will a good or 
fly from an evil, both of which are as yet unknown to him. 
Yet this is what educators are ver^^ apt to do : they want the 
child to think as they think, to will as they will, to act as 
they act ; or, rather, they want him to think, will, and act 
as they see that it is proper to think, will, and act. 

The injustice of such teachers arises from their ignorance. 
They have made for themselves rules of action, and pretend 
that the child shall observe the same rules. Where this pre- 
tension is too obviously absurd, they reduce it only so far 
as to say that the child has no rule of action l)ecause he has 
not yet arrived at the use of reason. This is going from 
one extreme to the other. The child, indeed, has not the 
same rule of actior)^ as the adult, and it is gross injustice to 
require it of him. But it is no less an error to say that he 
has no rules : he has his oivn ; and our lousiness is to guide 
him l)y these, and not l)y ours. It is true that he appears 
incapable of understanding our rules, when we put them 
before him ; but to infer from that the absence of any 
rule of mental action would be a great mistake. It is our 
fault that we are unacquainted with this rule, — that we have 
failed to observe and note it. The child, certainly, does not 
possess rules in any abstract form ; but his mind quickly 
sets them for itself, and it is this process of formation which 
should be the object of the educator's study, while it is just 
this which has hitherto been altogether neglected. It has 
not even been suspected that such mental rules were formed 
in the earliest period of infancy. 

208. We have already seen that the child, from the earli- 



130 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

est stage of intelligence, perceives sensitive and intelligent 
being, as be also perceives the object which is beautiful in 
his eyes. Here we have the source of the two primordial 
guides of his mental action, which his affections will follow. 
He will soon love the sensitive, intelligent being, and admire 
the beautiful object. His affection and his admiration fol- 
low the earliest light of his understanding : the moral action 
is born immediately of the intellectual one. 

It will help us to observe that these two effects of admira- 
tion and affection are not so distinct as they seem in the 
child's mind. In fact, what he really love^ is the heantifnl ; 
it is this that he admires, and therefore loves it : admi- 
ration is that fust appreciation which is the cradle of 
love. I admit that he sees a real difference between his 
mother's face and the button shining in the light ; but that 
is a real and specific difference only on the supposition we 
made, that souls interact on each other through the medium 
of living bodies. On the other hand, we have already seen 
that the child gives a soul to the shining button and to all 
other things, and therefore he not only admires but loves it. 
So true is it that the child loves that which he has first 
admired ; that, in baby language, pretty means equally 
lovable^ and ugly^ unlovable. Those two words have a most 
extensive meaning for infants. This is equally proved by 
an observation which has been already made, that little chil- 
dren show compassion only towards the things they con- 
sider pretty, and that their hearts harden against the things 
which seem to them uo-lv.-^ 

209. In the second period, the standards which guide the 
child's affections assume another form. The words pretty and 

^ " Tout ce qui deplait k I'enfant," says Mad. Necker de Saussure, " endurcit 
son fime. Quand un animal blesse est joli, on lui A'oit partager vivenient sa souf- 
france; s'il est lai<l, il s'en detourne avec horreur. Sa compassion s'evanouit aus- 
sitot que certains defauts, tels que la difl'ormite ou le ridicule, lui font dedaigner 
de s'associer a I'etre souffrant." — L. III. c. vi. 



THE child's type of (IOODNESS. 131 

ugly^ good ami had^ etc., having been continually heard by 
him, he is no longer affected only by what is pretty and ugly, 
but already a certain type of goodness and beauty is formed 
in his mind, and he is moved by this abstraction ; by it he 
understands and loves absent objects which are good and 
beautiful ; he desires and learns to seek them, while exactly 
the contrary process takes place as regards evil ones. 

It is true that this abstract standard, this first type of 
good, is still closely bound to the object, and at first is no 
more than the sound of the word associated with various 
objects, of which his memory retains the perception and the 
image ; but, little by little, it becomes a real semi-abstract 
idea, i. e. an idea composed of the imaginal ideas of the 
objects seen. This semi-abstract idea, type of the beautiful 
and the good, is the nearest to the objects after the imaginal 
ideas, so that, guided by its standard, the mind has but a 
step to make to arrive at the objects themselves. Hence 
the child's affections, under its impulse, retain much of the 
eagerness and impetuosity of their earliest manifestations.^ 
He does not as yet seek by a variety of means to attain the 
desired ol)ject, but springs to grasp it at once. 

210. Now this type of good, thus formed by the child so 
early as the second order of cognitions, and becoming his 
rule of action, is different in form from the rule supplied to 
him by Nature herself in the earlier stage of his mental life ; 
but at bottom it is the same. It is the good and the beauti- 
ful that the child admires and loves at both periods alike ; 
but in the first, he loves and admires the good and beautiful 
objects ; in the second, he begins to love the good and the 

1 These primitive desires are so violent, that Mad. Necker de Saussure recom- 
mends that childi-en should not be allowed to see the preparations .for their meals, 
lest this should excite them too much. Ce sera jmr consequent une attention sa/u- 
taire que (Vevlter de les rencJre temoins des preparatifs de leurs repas. Le desir 
ai<juise i)ar la vue de Vohjet qui jK'ut Vapaiser, devient chez eux dhme vivacite 
douloureuse. La certitude que ce desir sera satis/ait ne les calme point, et V exper- 
ience est alors plutot une peine qu'un plaisir pour eux. — L. II. c. iii. 



132 ON THE liULING PKINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

beautiful in the objects. The good aud the beautiful are 
presented to his mind in a new form ; but his will, in both 
cases, has the same object. 

This identical object, this goodness and beauty, on which 
the affections of tlie infant are fixed, remains the constant 
object of human affections throughout the life of man, in the 
period of his greatest vigor and intellectual development, 
as in the decline of his faculties in age ; and towards it he 
])reathes his last dying sigh, and hopes to attain it in eter- 
nity. But if the object remains fundamentally the same, the 
mode of conceiving it is by no means the same, and thus 
the acts of the will are modified by the form in which- the 
understanding presents the good and the beautiful. 

211. That form chanoes with each order of cognitions. 
But, as besides this advance, which consists in passing 
from one stage of cognition to another, there is also a' second 
progress which takes place within each stage of cognition, 
and demands no small amount of time, so the type of the good 
which governs the will retains the force proper to a given 
order of cognition, while becoming amplified and perfected. 
The arduous task imposed on the educators of youth, is to 
follow these mutations of form from one period to another, 
together with the steps of its development within each period. 
For it is this type in the child's mind at each stage of its 
existence which they must make use of to guide its moral 
progress. And they must demand from it neither more 
nor less than this : that it shall follow the rule of ffood- 
ness which nature has formed within it, and not any 
other. To demand no exercise of virtue from the child is 
educational indolence arising from ignorance ; to demand 
that he shall be virtuous, according to a standard as yet 
unknown to him, is a pedantic absurdity, the tyranny of peda- 
gogues. It must entail violence, ill-humor, blind anger in 
the teacher, which will be the only things his unhappy disciple 



THE CHILD S MOKAL liULE. 133 

will learn of him. It follows that the child must always be 
considered as a moral being, for such he always is ; but, at 
the same time, the form and nature of his morality at each 
stage of childhood has to be investigated, and herein lies 
the secret of child-nature, to be fathomed only by arduous 
study, by observation and profound meditation. 

ARTICLE III. 

WHAT IS THE MORAL RULE OF THE CHILD ARRIVED AT THE SECOND ORDER 

OF COGNITIONS? 

212. Having arrived at the second order of cognitions in 
the child, we have also pointed out what form his morality 
can take. 

He has an idea of goodness apart from subsistent objects, 
though one or other of the latter is constantly associated 
with it. That idea is not only apart from subsistent objects, 
as are all imaginal ideas, but it is also different from the 
latter. For imaginal ideas faithfully represent the object as 
it appears to the senses ; but the idea of goodness expresses 
none of the indifferent or bad parts of the object, but only 
the element which is good ; as the idea of badness, leaving 
aside the good or indifferent parts, retains only the element 
which is bad. This idea of goodness or badness, therefore, 
is not only universal as are all imaginal ideas, but it is in 
so far abstract, that it fixes attention solely on one deter- 
mination, on a single quality of the object, apart from all 
others. 

But what is good and what is bad to a child whose devel- 
opment has attained onlv to the second order of cognitions ^ 

The abstractions through which a child at that stage has 
arrived at the idea of good and evil can have been derived 
only from his perceptions of sensible objects and their 
imaginal ideas : for his mind contains nothing else capable 
of attracting his attention. Language, also, the instrument 



134 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

by wliicli he has accomplished the great work of abstract- 
ing from the objects perceived, imagined, ideated by 
him, the good or evil element in them, has continually 
directed his attention to sensible objects by the continual 
repetition he hears from his mother and nurse of the words 
in reference to them : " This is good, this is not good, this 
is bad." 

The good and the bad, then, of which the child forms an 
idea, are a goodness and a badness presented to him by his 
senses. 

213. This goodness and badness have in them both a sub- 
jective and an objective element. 

The objective element belongs to the intellect, and is the 
beautiful and admirable in the object which the child so 
admires and loves. As I have already pointed out, closer 
observation proves that the child from the beginning judges 
everything to be alive. But this judgment, by which the child 
holds everything to be living, must not be confounded with 
the conjecture I made above, that beings really living ex- 
ercise upon him an influence coming from their souls, and 
passing into his soul, although in both cases through the 
medium of the body. Should this action, as yet little noticed 
by philosophers, be ascertained and verified as a fact, its 
effect on the child must be classed as a feeling^ and not con- 
founded with the judgment formed by the child himself. 
The latter may be mistaken ; the feeling is always real. 
The child may act both on the one and the other. Feeling, 
until it is perceived by the intellect, has only a subjective 
existence. Hence, in the goodness perceived by the child 
there is a double subjective element, i. e. the corporeal sensa- 
tion and the animastic sentiment (feeling of the soul) . 

214. From this analysis of goodness, as understood by 
the child, arises the question whether the objective element 
enters into his idea of it, as well as the subjective. This is 



HOW THE IDEA OF GOOD IS FORMED. 135 

an important question in determining the state of the child's 
mind and soul with regard to the good, and to answer it we 
must recall two principles already laid down : 

(1) That the child's attention is primarily excited solely by 
external stimuli ; its spontaneous action is always towards 
external objects, and turns inward to the subject only later, 
and when constrained to do so by special causes (98, 188). 

(2) That in its primary perceptions the intellectual subject 
affirms only an entity, but not the qualities or determinations 
of such entity, which it is satisfied to have in feeling ; and 
not till afterwards, and little by little, according as it is 
impelled by its necessities, does it direct attention to these 
sensible determinations of the entity (109 and foil). 

Now, it is evident that, to form an idea of goodness, we 
must previously have some perceptions of what is good ; for 
every such idea is a concept-idea. ^ The perceptions, there- 
fore,, from which the idea of goodness is worked out, however 
imperfectly, must be, not simple perceptions affirming only 
being, but perceptions somewhat elaborated which affirm 
also the good in being. 

But to affirm this good, to affirm a good being, is to affirm 
an object; and simply to affirm an ol)ject, without going 
further, is an infinitely easier and more spontaneous process 
for the human mind than to affirm itself as subject, and by 
so doing change the spliject into an object of the intellect. 
Previous to the third period of childhood, there is nothing 
to impel man to turn his mental activity in a direction 
so opposed to the natural one, or to force it, from the 
straight line of advance it has taken, to retrace its steps, 
and fall back upon itself, upon the subject whence it ema- 
nates. We shall speak further on of self-knowledge, and 
show how late it is manifested in the child ; yet, until he has 

1 I call a concei)t-idea that which gives, besides being, some determiuation of 
the mode of being. 



136 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

arrived at it lie cannot attribute the suljjective element to 
himself. 

215. But admitting this, may he not, nevertheless, per- 
ceive this element? Assuredl}^ he does, for otherwise he 
could not abstract the idea of good from his perception ; but 
he does not recognize it as subjective; he perceives it as a 
simple object. Hence his own pleasures, his own pains, 
which, in so far as they are feelings, exist in the subject, 
in so far as the}^ are observed and perceived by his under- 
standing, are objects, are qualities and properties of real 
entities perceived by his intellect. All the affections of 
admiration and love, of disgust and aversion, manifested by 
the child are directed, not to the pleasure and pain he feels in 
himself, but to pleasant or painful ol)jects : it is in these that 
he sees the seat of his pleasure or his pain. Although what 
he feels is internal to the sense, yet it is external to the 
intellect, and it is long ere the intellect restores its pleasures 
to the subject. 

The effects produced by pleasure and pain are produced 
equally by all sensations which come to man through his 
external organs. The intellect, the law of which is to con- 
ceive everything objectively, sees the primary sensations, i. e. 
color, taste, smell, etc., in the objects whose being it affirms 
in its first perception, and thus aflirms because of the action 
they exercise on the senses. This is the reason why mankind 
in general regard as qualities of bodies these modifications 
of their own feelings ; and it is only through deep and as- 
siduous philosophical reflection that we succeed in completely 
dissipating this error, and stripping external forms of the 
borrowed vestments in which our childhood clothed them, 
adorned them, giving them, as it were, flesh and blood. And 
verily these forces, so denuded by the inexorable thought of 
the philosopher, remain dry skeletons, I had almost said, — 
thin, imperceptible ghosts, and nothing more. 



WHAT IS THE child's MORAL VIRTUE? 137 

216. From these observations follows the singular conse- 
quence that the child who, in his animal life, acts wholly 
subjectively, begins with his human life to act on objective 
motives, long l)efore either his intellect or his will has learnt 
to recognize and love that which is subjective, that which 
can be referred to himself. For his infant intelligence does 
not see those same sensible things which properly belong to 
the subject, as such, but contemplates and loves and hates 
them as so many objects. 

Hence, it has been justly observed that children show an 
admirable disinterestedness in things which they do under 
the influence of pleasure and pain ; and it is the error of 
those who are incapable of observing human nature to 
assert that self-love is the first of the affections to manifest 
itself. •'^ The authoress we have so often quoted says, with 
delicate observation, that the child "too deficient in fore- 
thought to let himself be the slave of his w^ants, has the 
mania and sometimes the pride of independence, and though 
he receives everything at our hands, his affection yet wears 
an air of disinterestedness." 

217. If, then, we proceed to deduce from all this what 
is the moral virtue of the J'^oung child, we shall find that it 
consists wholly in benevolence, for this benevolence is objec- 
tive and, therefore, impartial, disinterested, and preceded by 
esteem for the ol)ject loved. It is, indeed, no other than the 
benevolence to which the virtue of man in all periods of life 
may be reduced ; for goodness is love.^ From this we per- 
ceive that the difference between the virtue of the child and 
that of the man (leaving merit aside), does not consist in 

1 We must distinguish the animal and instinctive, from intelligent, actions. I 
have shown that it is equally a mistake to attribute the animal actions to self- 
interest, or to call them disinterested. The truth is, that such action is neither 
interested nor disinterested, and the same may be said of the action of feeling in 
general. See Storia ComjKiratlva c/e' Slstcmi Morali, c. iv. art. 4, Compara- 
tive History of Moral Systems. 

- This truth follows, as it seems to us, manifestly, from all we have written on 
morals. 



138 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

the one being benevolence and the other not, since both are 
equally benevolence, but in the different object of this benev- 
olence ; for this object expands in proportion to age and the 
progress of knowledge. 

218. It has been already shown that the object of benevo- 
lence or love can be no other than a good. What good, 
then, can be known to the child who has reached only the 
seconi order of cognitions ? 

If these cognitions have no other object than sensible 
things, it is clear that he will love what his senses repre- 
sent to him as beautiful and lovable, — food, light, the smil- 
ing countenance of another human being : these and such as 
these are the elements from which he gathers his conception 
of good which afterwards governs all his affections. He 
finds and recognizes the good in all that causes him pleasur- 
able sensations, and he loves it all with effusive and impar- 
tial affection. That is his moral rule : it is not ours, indeed, 
but for him it is the right one and the only one possible. 
If we do not disturb his inward processes, he will fol- 
low it with simplicity and entire loyalty ; he is just in his 
dealings, though without knowing it ; his morality exists, 
although as yet he has attained no consciousness of it. 

ARTICLE IV. 

CAN THE MORALITY OF THE CHIL1> BE INJURED WHILE HE IS STILL IN THE 
SECOND STAGE OF COGNITIONS? 

219. The child whose understanding has reached the 
second grade of cognitions may injure his morality in two 
ways : 

(1) By forming for himself false rules regarding good 
and evil. 

(2) B}^ not faithfull}^ guiding his affections and actions by 
the rule of good and evil which he has rightly formed. 

220« If we suppose the child to be uninfluenced by other 
persons, he could not form a false rule, unless his primary 



MORALITY IN THE SECOND STAGE OF COGNITIONS. 139 

perceptions had shown him good objects as bad and bad 
as good ; for it is from these perceptions that he afterwards 
gains the conceptions of good and evil on wliich his rule 
is formed. But this is impossible, for perception follows 
sensation, and sensation cannot err.-^ 

The child, however, is not thus left to himself ; his con- 
ceptions are abstractions which he forms by the help of the 
language he learns from those around him. It is true that 
he could not be altogether misled by those who first speak 
to him ; for, if they always called that good which his senses 
taught him was bad, he would end by understanding the 
word "good" to signify "bad," and "bad" to signify 
" good " ; his mistake applying only to words, not to things. 
But if the child is thus safe from error when first learuino- to 
speak, will he retain the same immunity when he has gained 
the use of a larger vocabulary ? Suppose that to the words 
"good " and "bad " he attaches a right meaning, — within, of 
course, the limits of his experience of good and evil, — will 
he not soon fall into the errors of those around liim ? ^ If, 
when he has learned to understand the meaning of the word 
" bad," he is told that that is bad which is good, will he not 
end by believing it? His senses tell iiim the contrary, in- 
deed ; but is it true that at that age he trusts altogether his 
own senses, his own experience? 

221. This is certain, that, besides the senses and the intel- 
ligence, the faculty for persuasion ^ awakens very early in the 

1 In the JVew Ess^ay, No. 124G, I showed that perceptions and the primary ideas 
are given by natnre independently of human will, and are, therefore, free from 
error. 

2 It will be objected that, in that case the child must have passed to the tliird 
grade of cognitions; but, on further consideration, it will appear that this is not a 
necessary consequence, for the conception of good, so long as it is derived imme- 
diately from perceptions or imaginal ideas, is always the result of cognitions of the 
second order. 

3 See, hi the Synoptical Table of the Faculties of the Human Mind, at the end 
of the third book of the AntliropoJogij, the i)lace of persuasion, — a faculty so im- 
portant and so overlooked by philosophers. 



140 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

child, and one of its functions is voluntary belief, voluntary 
adhesion to the affirmation of others. 

Not only have we the power to l3elieve voluntarily what 
is told to us by others, but we are naturally inclined 
to it, and this is the reason of the harm done to children by 
the evil they hear. Even when the evil spoken of is of a 
kind which as yet offers no temptation to a child, he ac- 
cepts it readily from the pure need of believing, of being 
in unison with the feeling of others. This tendency shows 
itself visibly in the earliest stage of infancy, and wonder- 
fully helps the infant to understand its mother's speech. It 
follows that truthfulness is absolutely necessary to the edu- 
cator, from the very earliest words spoken to a baby in its 
cradle. 

In fact, if a child's teachers do not invariably call that 
good which is good to him, he will find a discrepancy be- 
tween that which he feels through his senses and that wdiich 
is affirmed to him by others. His two faculties of feeling 
and believing will thus be placed in contradiction to each 
other, and nothing so delays and hinders his development as 
this contradiction, causing a struggle between his faculties, 
the one destroying what the other is striving to build up. 
The poor infant does not know^ which side to take, nor 
whether he is deceived by his faculty of sense or that of 
belief ; his mind is confused ; he loses the power to form any 
steady opinion concerning the merits of things, and, till he 
has decided for the one faculty or the other, he remains 
in a state of useless uncertainty and disturbance. Far from 
making progress, he loses for a long while the calmness, 
clearness, and order which are the indispensable conditions 
of progress. Even when he has chosen which of the con- 
tendino; faculties he will adhere to, he will have no firm faith 
in it ; he will believe in it half hesitatingly ; this will lead to 
weakness of character, to the want of strong impressions, of 



NEED OF TRUTHFULNESS. 141 

large and simple feelings, and of the decided activity which 
is their result. If he relies upon the opinions of others, 
rejecting the testimony of his own feeling, he loses the sure 
guidance of the latter, and it may be predicted that he will 
turn out, at best, a light-minded man. If, on the other 
hand, he holds to his own feeling and rejects the authority 
of others, in so doing he sows the seeds of distrust towards 
his fellow-men, and, after a rebellious youth, he will reap in 
his later years the fruits of discord, of selfishness, and of 
an inexplicable malignity. 

It is, then, of the first importance to education at that 
age that speech should always be exact and truthful, and in 
unison with the best feelino;s of the child. 

The child who is led by others to form false and imper- 
fect conceptions of good will assuredly derive from them 
false and imperfect rules of morality. Yet the child is not 
guilty of immorality in thus yielding to the deception ; for 
he does not wilfully despise or wrong others, nor does he 
hate them ; he only adheres to one or the other faculty, 
in the impossibility of holding to both, and his choice 
between them is not arbitrary, l)ut guided by his inclination 
to one or the other. We must distinguish, however, between 
immorality and the inclination to immorality. The false 
conceptions and false standards of the child are not in 
themselves immoral, but produce a disposition to immorality 
in the time to come. 

222. We have another question to. consider, whether the 
child who has reached the second grade of cognitions always 
follows his own rules of good and evil, or occasionally de- 
parts from them wilfully. To this we answer, that he will 
always follow them faithfully, and could not depart from them 
before having reached the third grade of cognitions. For, 
after he has formed his rule of good and evil, he must, 
to depart from it, form a practical judgment, that what 



142 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

he bad, by tliat rule, held to be good, is evil, which sup- 
poses a new reflection. Of this we shall speak in the next 
section. 

ARTICLE V. 

HOW TO MAKE USE OF THE CHILD'S FACULTY OF BELIEF, TO INCLIXE HIM 

TO MORAL GOODNESS. 

223. It must always be borne in mind, that ever}^ form 
of moral goodness is a form of benevolence, and all moral 
evil is only hate, or a limit put upon benevolence. 

Now the educator has two offices to perform as regards 
the benevolence of the child : 1. To inspire it ; 2. To guide 
it properly.^ 

The first of these offices is as important as the second ; 
for the sum of l)enevolence evolved from a human soul is 
the material of which its virtue will l)e composed.^ He who 
has a large amount of benevolence will easily become a 
virtuous man. 

Let us consider, first, how to develop the benevolence in 
the child, and next how to direct it. 

224. In the two earlier periods of infancy, the child, who 
can as yet neither speak nor form abstract conceptions, can 
be moved to benevolence only through the pleasurable sensa- 
tions he receives from external objects. As we have al- 
ready said, to keep the child habitually tranquil, serene, and 
happy, opens his heart to benevolent feelings. 

When, however, he has reached the thu'd period, it is 
time that his teacher should employ language as a means 

1 K we consider the matter attentively, we shall find that it is disorder which 
limits benevolence. Universal benevolence, on the contrary, is ordered benevo- 
lence. To prove this is the object of my book entitled Storia delV Amore, " His- 
tory of Love. " 

2 Mad. Necker de Saiissnre properly reproves mothers for the jealousy with 
which they keep away inferiors whom they consider as rivals in the affections 
of their children : " C'est mnl entendre Jeur projjre interet," she says, " les affec- 
tions se transplantent plus aisement qu'eUes ne croissenti'" 



CULTIVATIOK OF BENEVOLENCE. 143 

to the same end, and this is made easy by the faculty of 
persuasion, so early manifested in children, not only through 
the action of perception, but also through that of faith. 

Those who have to educate the child, or simply talk to 
him, should as a rule, therefore, frequently praise the things 
that are good, and very seldom blame the bad ones, about 
whicli it is better to be silent ; in other words, great use 
should be made of the epithets pretty^ good., right, and as 
little as possible of the contrary ones, ugly^ bad, ivrong, 
etc. To apply the latter to persons would be a very serious 
error. -^ 

The child, thus hearing only the praises of things as 
good and pretty, and never blame, will have his benevolent 
affections, which necessarily follow his thoughts, more rap- 
idly developed than the contrary ones of malevolence ; his 
love and gratitude will flow towards all that surrounds him. 
It is scarcely possible to find anything which cannot in 
some one aspect be presented to him as good and beautiful, 
and therefore lovable. 

AKTICLE VI. 

OTHER MEANS TOWARDS THE SAME END. 

225. By the time the child begins to understand the 
conventional signs of words, he also understands the 
natural signs of action and gesticulation. This natural 
language helps him to learn the conventional one, and vice 
versa: the two are learned together as one and the same.^ 

1 As the child, according to my belief, takes all things equally to be persons, 
there is the more reason for being careful not to speak ill of anything before 
him. 

2 Sometimes the child in the second period will reproduce action and gesture 
through his instinct of imitation. It may be also that some animastic (soul) feelmg 
mingles with his perceptions. But such actions and gestures influence him more 
powerfully, when he attributes a meaning to them and tjiey become to him a lan- 
guage. For this reason I have reserved mention of them till now. 



144 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

When the actions and gestures express feelings, the latter 
awake in him at sight of the former, whether through some 
animastic influence, or through the instinct of imitation lead- 
ing him to reproduce the gestures which are naturally asso- 
ciated with such feelings, or whether both these causes unite 
to form that wonderful sympathy which is. shown by children. 
But in the third period not only is he thus moved, but the 
acts and gestures have become to him real signs which 
reveal to him the inward feelings of those who use them. 

Let me be permitted to refer again to the observations 
of another writer : — 

" The same faculty, already manifested at seven weeks old, is 
at the end of a year greatly developed. At that age a lively and 
therefore forward child can read the expression of faces. You will 
see him reproducing all the changes of your own mood : he does 
not know whence comes your change, and yet he shares it with 
you, and, remaining a stranger to all the causes, he associates him- 
self with all the effects. He is a mirror reflecting with marvellous 
fidelity your moral condition. 

"I will quote, as an example, a fact I witnessed in a still 
younger child, only nine months old. He was happily playing on 
his mother's knee, when a woman came into the room whose face 
wore a look of marked, though quiet, sadness. The child's atten- 
tion was attracted by this person, whom he knew, but had no 
special affection for. Little by little his face changed ; he let fall 
his toys, and finally clung crying to his mother's breast. What 
he felt was, not fear or pity or affection : he simply suffered, and 
relieved his pain by tears. 

" Li the same way a child of fifteen or sixteen months old, if 
present when some serious reading is going on, and all the faces 
around him express a certain solemnity of feeling, is generally 
subdued into respect, — a fact which explains how the religious 
sentiment, apparently so above the capacity of children of tender 
years, can yet awaken very early in those young souls. An im- 
pression, at first objectless, but not without analogy to the solemn 
emotion accompanying sincere worship, is communicated to the 



CULTIVATION OF BENEVOLENCE. 145 

child through sympathy. He feels himself in a holy place ; the 
idea of something sacred gradually dawns upon his mind, and, 
wlien soon after he hears God named as the invisible object of 
our eternal adoration, the conception of a hidden power is not 
a strange wonder to him : he believes himself to have felt the 
solemn influence of its presence." ^ 

We are bound to avail ourselves of these facts. 

226. We must also take care that even the natural 
language of signs shall communicate to the child only 
gentle and reverent thoughts. They will grow up within 
him, if everything he sees and hears tends to manifest 
and inspire them. 

We may convince ourselves, on the same grounds, of the 
hurtful influence, on the tender soul of the little child, of 
external signs of anger, envy, hate, malignit}^, scorn, etc. 
They are to him so many corrupting words, whence he derives 
endless contamination. Equally hurtful to him is the influ- 
ence of terror, of sudden fright caused by words or actions ; 
but so much has been said on this head by others that I 
need not insist upon it. I will only point out, as before, 
that Nature should be our mistress in education, and that, if 
we observe her, we shall find that she always disposes the 
child to hope and cheerfulness, and keeps off sad and fearful 
thoughts. Children never invent for themselves gloomy, sad, 
or painful fancies ; their imaginations are always l)right, 
joyous, gay. This holds good not of cliildhood only : it 
is the constant law of human nature. Why, then, do we 
not aid this natural disposition? AVhy do we not try to 
follow Providence, by whom that nature was constituted, 
and avoid saddening and terrorizing the spirit which it 
impels to hope and courage? 

1 Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. II. c. iv. 



146 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ARTICLE VII. 

ON RESISTANCE, CONSIDERED IN RELATION TO THE THIRD PERIOD OF 

CHILDHOOD. 

227. But, we may ask, is not fear also a natural affection 
of the human soul, and why is it placed tliere ? The answer 
is, that man may also be restrained within the limits of duty 
hy the fear of a higher power, — that through this fear, he 
may be made to feel his own weakness in comparison with 
the power without him, which is the power of the Creator, or 
of those who do the Creator's will. Such fear as this is not 
needed by the infant, who would be incapable of recognizing 
it as the minister of divine justice ; and the fantastic terror 
we might, in our folly, inspire in the childish mind would have 
no moral character, but be only a blind dread, confusing, 
instead of directing, its action. As to the sense of its own 
weakness, it is but too strong already, and the reverential 
fear towards the Supreme Being can be excited in it only b}^ 
the idea of a supremely good being, and in no other way. 

228. Having, then, excluded the agency of fancifully 
excited fears on the mind of the little child, we have still 
to inquire whether we ought to resist his inclinations, and 
if so,- to what extent? 

In the first place, there can be no doulit that, when he 
wishes for something injurious to health, he must be resisted ; 
but it should be in such a manner as to give him as little 
pain as possible ; and the best rule is to manage things so 
as to prevent such wishes from arising. They are physical, 
not moral, and it would be unjust, therefore, not to use 
the gentlest means of eluding them. But, besides this physi- 
cal disturbance, he may very possibl}^ show inclinations of 
an immoral kind. In treating of the resistance we must 
oppose to these, we shall arrive at the answer to the 
question proposed above, — What are the means of regulat- 
ing the child's benevolence? 



REGULATION OF THE CHILD'S AFFECTIONS. ' 147 

§ 1. — Exercise of patieyice which iriay he required of the 

child. 

229. One of the earliest aiiti-moral inclinations exhibited 
by children is impatience, although this is due rather to 
habit than anything else. A certain exercise of patience 
should be requu-ed of them, but very delicate treatment is 
necessary here. We will quote a mother's advice with 
regard to it : — 

" So long as the child is playing contentedly, you may go on 
with your own occupations. A look, a sign of intelligence from 
time to time, is enough to make him feel you are watching over 
him ; and his sense of safety from it is perfect. Never let him 
find himself deceived in this. If pain should come on, or if his 
inward activity should begin to flag, so that he can no longer 
throw himself into the things around him, go to him. Yet do 
not hurry and try to give him occasion for a slight exercise of 
patience ; make him learn, if you can, the meaning of the word 
Wait. If that word is made to signify to him invariably a sacred 
pronnse, it will acquire by degrees a great value in his mind; he 
will come to understand that he is to receive, but not to exact, 
and this will make him more grateful and affectionate." ^ 

The patience thus required is not physical suffering, which 
the child should alwa3^s be spared, but moral suffering, if 
indeed it can be termed suffering, and it trains both the 
understanding and the moral nature. He waits cheerfulh^, 
and thus already begins to regulate his affections. 

§ 2. — Correction of the child's conceptions. 

230. Feeling is Iw its nature impatient.^ To wait pa- 
tiently is always an exercise of intelligence. 

1 Mad. Necker de Saiissure, L. II. c. iii. 

2 On the diverse characteristics to be observed in the action of feeling and in 
that of intelligence, see Delia Societd ed il suo fine, " Society and its End," 

B. in. c. V. 



148 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

The impatience of feeling in man is not in itself a moral 
evil; but it is a had preparation for morality, and we should 
l)egin in good time to overcome it. Anger is also an im- 
pulse of feeling, and, in so far as it is such, it is only an 
evil inclination. As we have already pointed out, care 
should be taken to j)revent anything that might give birth 
to it in the child. 

These passions, and others of which we shall speak pres- 
ently, manifest themselves in earliest infancy ; for at that 
age the strength of sensual action is great. They require, 
therefore, to be met wisely by moral rather than physical 
resistance. 

231. The passions act powerfully on the will, and the 
latter on the understanding, so that the understanding pro- 
nounces that to be good which favors the passions, and 
that to be bad which opposes them. It follows that, if 
passions awaken in the child and destroy liis state of 
tranquillity, his conceptions will be falsified ; for his stand- 
ard of good will no longer be his natural feeling and healthy 
instinct, but a passionate desire and a corrupted instinct. 
The falsity of his conceptions of good and evil in things 
is, indeed, unobserved ; but, in the mean while, these form the 
child's rule of action, and he loves wrongly and hates what 
he should love. Such seeds of error in judgment and feel- 
ing are small as the mustard-seed, but grow silently into a 
branching tree ; from them come those youths with an in- 
explical)l3^ cold and evil temper ; from them men thoroughly 
bad and incorrigible. The fate of men too often depends on 
these un watched beginnings. 

To rectify these false conceptions in the child, we must 
sometimes ward off, and sometimes resist, his passion. It is 
a great mistake to flatter him, as is often done, l)y way of 
giving hhn pleasure ; it is an equal mistake to confirm him 
in his false conceptions, instead of replacing them by truer 



CORRECTION OF FALSE CONCEPTIONS. 149 

ones; above all, we must struggle against those amongst 
them which inspire him with feelings of aversion and lead 
him to form nnfavorable judgments. Our aim should be 
to make him see the good in things, and although he can, 
at that age, see only the good and evil presented to him 
))y his senses, yet we can tell him that those things are 
good which will be good for him in the future, and there- 
by facilitate the act of his understanding, by which, later 
on, he will verify our judgment. We can do this, as we 
have already pointed out, by availing ourselves of his faculty 
of belief. 

§ 3. — Rectification of bad feelings. 

232. Impatience and anger, which have their source in 
the animal nature, and which, while confined to that, are 
only anti-moral predispositions, easily gain the assent of 
the will, and then pass into immoral actions and habits. 

The feeling of aversion which also takes its rise in the 
animal nature quickly passes into the region of the under- 
standing and is transmuted into hate. I do not believe that 
the human mind at that tender age is susceptible of the 
passion of envy, which is grief at the happiness of others. 

The fact related by St. Augustine of the infant sucking 
at one breast looking askance at its foster-brother suckino- 
at the other (which is not an unfrequent one), bears the 
appearance of envy, but I should consider it simply a case 
of aversion. We may see the same thing in animals. Two 
dogs eating out of the same platter growl and snap at 
each other. It cannot be supposed that this is the effect 
of the displeasure each feels at the good of the other, 
but arises rather, in my opinion, from the fear each feels 
that the other will hinder and lessen his own good. The 
animal, through the unitive powei* in him, not through 
intelligence, may perfectly become aware of the lessening 



150 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

of the food, and he hates that lessening, and, at the same 
time, the otlier dog wliicli he associates with it in his fancy. 
The same animal operation takes place in the infant ; bnt 
later on, when the judgment of the understanding or only 
the act of the will is superadded to it, it is transformed 
into real hatred. 

233. Great care should be taken to prevent any occasion 
of such feelings, in infants who are unable to bear the 
strength of the temptation and have no arms wherewith 
to resist it. If we perceive them to have taken an aver- 
sion to an}^ one, we should do our utmost to remove it, 
and the most efficacious w^ay of doing this is to make the 
obnoxious persons the means of giving them some pleasure 
the}^ desire ; their personality will then cease to be obnox- 
ious, and the child wall lose its dislike. 

§4. — Removal of the limits too easily set to the benevolent 

affections. 

234. It is a phenomenon difficult to explain, why the 
child, and indeed the human being generally, though 
benevolent by nature, gradually limits his affections to a 
certain circle of persons and things. 

There seems no doubt that the new-born infant makes 
no difference between persons ; or at any rate, that he 
shows affection to any one who supplies his wants and 
caresses him. Thus, he often cares more for his nurse 
than his mother, if he is more accustomed to the former, 
and if she performs the mother's office towards him. Nor 
does he show any preference as to who shall be his nurse, 
but loves the one that is given to him, and at six weeks 
old smiles impartially back to whatever feminine face smiles 
first at him. The inclination to benevolence is thus general 
in the infant, so long* as it remains passive; but, so soon 
as it becomes active, it assumes a limited and exclusive 



EXPLANATION OF SHYNESS. 151 

form. At one year old the child already feels unpleasantly 
impressed by new faces, and this dislike which he takes to 
strangers goes on increasing with his years up to a certain 
age : he becomes timid, shy, rude ; shrinking from them, 
and taking a long time to get used to them. How is this 
phenomenon to be explained? I believe that several causes 
concur in producing it, and it is perhaps difficult to trace 
them all. 

235. In the first place, the rational affections are gov- 
erned by the intelligence which supplies their objects. Now, 
in the sphere of intelligence we must note the phenomenon 
of attention, which is a concentration of the scattered forces 
and, at first, inactive powers of the mind, bringing them to 
bear all together on a single point, a single object. The 
mind, when it has thus fixed its attention on one object, 
has no more to spare for others ; it takes no account of 
them, or at l)est a very slight one. Now this concentration 
of faculty in intelligence takes place also in the will. The 
latter, so long as its action is slack and divided, remains 
indifferent among the various objects present ; but, so soon 
as it is concentrated and applied to one, or to a given circle 
of objects, all others cease to exist for it ; its whole dis- 
posable amount of benevolence, so to speak, being akeady 
absorbed and exhausted by those it has selected. 

236. These facts would be sufficient to explain why the 
child who has become attached to one set of persons and 
things should be cold and indifferent to others. But this 
is not the whole state of the case. As he grows older, 
the child is not only indifferent to persons he is not in 
the habit of seeing, but he is startled and alarmed by 
their appearance. He shrinks from their approach to him, 
and shows himself disturbed, angry, and hostile to them. 
How are we to account for this? We will try to point 
out some of the principal causes which seem to us to 



152 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD, 

concur in producing this condition, witliout, however, feel- 
ing sure that we have exhausted them all. 

It seems probable that, when, the human heart has no more 
benevolence to dispose of, it retains the contrary affections, 
fear, ill-will, aversion, in a state of extreme susceptibility.^ 
To the child who has no more affection to give them, hi^' 
fellow-creatures appear mysterious beings, from whom he 
expects no good and whose power he fears : not being 
beautified by affection, — for it is love only that makes 
objects fair and sweet to us, — they become obnoxious to 
his mind, which is uncertain as to their good or evil nature. 
Others have already observed that a new idea presented to 
a child's mind produces something of the same kind of 
alarm. If this effect follows from a new idea, it is yet 
more likely to follow a new perception, where the latter is 
not softened and disguised by a yet stronger feeling of 
affection. 

237. To this we may add another physiological law, i. e. 
that man is always unwilling to retrace his steps either in 
thought or in affection ; to undo the acts of his intellectual 
and moral faculties in order to re-enact them differently. 
It is easy to convince ourselves of this by the following 
experiment on children : Tell them a story, and they will 
delight in it ; but woe to you if in telling it the second 
time you alter the least circumstance, or even add one ! 
They correct you at once, and insist upon having precisely 
the same representation. Why? Because that representa- 
tion being vividly impressed upon their minds, they cannot 
bear to spoil or efface that beautiful imaginary picture, to 
paint it over again. The same thing happens with the will 
of children as with their fancy and understanding. Unlike 
adults, who always reserve a certain portion of their affec- 
tions for the new objects which may prove deserving of 

1 See Storia dell' Amove, L. I. c. ii. 



UNWILLINGNESS TO REFORM CONCEPTIONS. 153 

thein iu future, children never think of the future, of which 
as yet they have no conception, and pour out on the first 
objects of their affection the whole treasure of their love. 
I have already spoken of the vehemence and singleness of 
childish passions (158-162). This being premised, it is 
evident that a new person appearing before them naturally 
invites their affection ; but, to give it, they must first with- 
draw some portion previously disposed of elsewhere and 
bestow it on this new object. Now this is peculiarly ob- 
noxious to them for two reasons : first, because they would 
have to go back on a benevolent action already accom- 
plished, so as to diminish it ; and, secondly, because they 
do not see how their affection can be withdrawn from the 
things they love. Would it not ])e wronging them? IIow 
can they begin to love less those to whom they have given 
all the love they have? By what fault have they ceased 
to deserve it? Children are susceptible of a feeling similar 
to, and yet opposed to, jealousy. As the jealous person 
suffers and is irritated by the fear of being robbed by 
another of the affection of the loved one, so the child is 
the lover fearing lest his own affection for his loved 
one should be stolen or diminished, and refusing to give 
it up. This affection of the child is not given to persons 
only, but to everything about him ; and this explains why 
changes in the circumstances and order of his life annoy 
him so much, and put him out of temper. 

238. There is a third reason following from the second, 
which is bound up in the phenomenon we are endeavoring 
to explain. The child's first instinct is to avoid pain ; the 
second, to enjoy in peace his own well-being ; his nature 
is full of pleasure, because full of life and sensibility. 
Moreover, when he has distributed all his affections amons 
the things and persons with whom he finds himself, he has 
marked out in his thoughts the sphere of his happiness. 



154 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

There lie all his joys, and he cannot imagine any others. 
What wonder, then, if he is jealous of such a domain? 
A new object introduced into- it is a break in that whole 
which forms his state of existence, and which he perceives 
as one thing : it spoils his infant paradise, in which he 
cannot bear any change, any more than in the story which 
is told to him. We may trace an affinity between this 
tendency of children and the instinct and idea of prop- 
erty which awakens so early in their minds. All the 
things a])Out them become, by the unitive force of their 
feelings, a part of themselves, and to take away any one 
is a violence done to them. This i^henomenon may be 
observed in animals also ; for it is an effect of the unitive 
force which belongs to their nature as to man's, and it 
has the appearance of the thought and love of property, 
which it is not. The idea of property follows it, however, 
as I have said. Mad. Necker de Saussure relates having 
seen a little girl of eighteen months cry, if any one touched 
her nurse's work-basket. "One day," she adds, "the 
same child, seeing a strange woman carry away a dress 
of her mother's, began to scream violently. The same 
thing happened the next day ; and, from that time, she 
showed uneasiness at the sight of strangers, and, when they 
went away empty-handed she would accompany them to the 
door with a politeness which showed how great was her 
relief at their departure."^ 

239. There is, finally, a fourth and deeper cause which 
I believe to have a large share in the limitation of children's 
affections at a certain age, and that is the special nature 
of their attachment to actual individual objects. There are, 
in fact, two forms common to every entity : the ideal, which 
is the principle of universality ; and the real, which is the 
principle of individuality. To these two forms of the entity 

1 B. III. c. i. 



NATURE OF AFFECTION FOR OBJECTS. 155 

correspond in ns two powers : that of intellect^ tlirongh which 
we have the intuition of the ideal ; and feeling^ which con- 
stitutes all reality. The reality of feeling is subsequent!}' 
confirmed ])y our judgment, which is a third power. In the 
intellectual order, then, the intellect gives us the idea and 
judgment gives us the thing (res). Then follows the will, 
going out witli its affections towards both tlie idea and the 
thing ; for it may find its term in l)otli forms of being. If, 
then, we love any ol)ject for its good qualities, we love it in 
and for its ideal form ; but if we love an object for itself, 
and not only for its qualities, we love it in its reality. The 
idea being, as we have said, the principle of universality, 
our love is, in the first case, universal also, and therefore 
ready to turn to whatever other objects possess the same 
gifts and qualities on which alone it is fixed. The reaZ, on 
the contrary, being the principle of the particular, our love 
for it, in the second case, is particular and exclusive, 
and refuses any other object, solely because it is another, 
though it may have the same good qualities as the first. 
This second kind of love is the principle of restriction and 
limitation of benevolence, and its nature is anti-moral where 
it does not find its term in the divine. Self-love is of this 
second kind : we love ourselves, not for the good qualities 
we possess, but because we are ourselves. Parental affection 
is of the same character. What father or mother would take 
an angel of goodness and beauty in exchange for their own 
ugly, ill-conditioned offspring? They want their own, and 
love it personally above all others. Physical love is a third 
example of the same species : lovers care only for the one 
person to whom they have devoted themselves, and demand 
a similar love in return : hence their jealousy, which is the 
fear lest the individual, personal love of their loved one 
should be drawn away by an ideal love, ^. e. love of the good 
qualities of others. In children, the love which rests on the 



156 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

good qualities of the thing or person (ideality) is intimately 
bound up with that which is giveii to the actual thing or 
person, and easily degenerates into a love in which the latter 
element (that is, love of the real individual) prevails and 
holds dominion. In proof of this I will quote the following 
incident related by an acute observer : "A little girl let fall 
her beloved doll, which unfortunatel}^ broke its nose. Screams 
and utter despair followed, which were increased by the im- 
prudence of her father, who, taking the matter too lightly, 
half in joke and half in attempting to mend the unhappy 
nose, melted it away altogether, leaving only an immense 
hole in its place. This threw the child into such a passion of 
mingled grief and anger that she nearly went into convulsions. 
Those about her did their best to comfort and quiet her by 
promising that the doll should be taken away and cured, and 
at last the weary child was got off to sleep. While she slept 
a new head was bought and put on the doll, in the belief 
that this would make her quite happy on waking. But, 
on the contrary, her grief became more violent than ever, 
and assumed a touching tenderness. She was no longer the 
little fury, but a true mother to whom they had dared to offer 
another child in the place of her own. She could scarcely 
speak for sobs. 'Oh, it is not — it is not my doll ! I knew 
her, — I don't know this one ! Do they think I am going 
to love it? . . . Take it away ! I won't look at it again ! "^ 
Every mother, or other person accustomed to watch chil- 
dren, will bear witness to similar facts, proving that their 
affection is given, not to the good qualities in an individual, 
but to the reality of the actual person. True it is that this love 
has its origin also in the ideal and universal love ; that is, in 
the love of good qualities, real or supposed ; for the human 
heart can begin to love only svb sj^ecie boni, l)ut later on it 
degenerates and becomes corrupted : it substitutes the person 

1 Mad. Necker tie Saussure, L. III. c. v. 



REALISTIC AND IDEAL LOVE. 157 

or tiling for the good qualities and gifts which it saw or 
accustomed itself to see in them ; at first it believes them to 
he so inherent in the person or thing that they cannot exist 
elsewhere, and are found there alone ; next, the good quali- 
ties are loved rather because they are found in the loved 
person or thing than for their own sake ; and at last, the 
individuals are loved for themselves alone, even when they 
have lost the qualities for which they were first beloved, 
and which now, when found in others, cease to excite love. 
Love, in fact, has here become profoundly immoral. 

240. Let it be noted, however, that in speaking of the 
love which has the ideal for its object, I did not mean that 
it excluded the real. A love that should exclude reality 
would be rather an incipient than actual love ; it is that 
which has been termed platonic^ and which is felt neither by 
children nor the mass of mankind, but solely by the philoso- 
pher by nature, who arrives at ideas, but can neither go 
beyond nor realize them. That kind of philosophical love to 
which may be ascribed the best part of natural virtue does 
not enter into our present subject. The love which we have 
described has for its object the entity in and for its ideal 
form. The ideci^ then, i. e. the good seen in the idea, is the 
standard by which actual entities are loved ; the latter are 
truly loved ; yet not only because they exist, but because 
they exist with the gifts and qualities which make them lov- 
able. The other kind of love we have spoken of loves the 
actual entities without going beyond, and forgetting or even 
excluding theu' good qualities. 

I am well aware that this simple preamble to what I have 
further to say on this subject will send a chill to the hearts 
of all mothers, wives, fathers, and husbands ; but I am bound 
to speak the truth, and to put before everything else the dio-- 
nity of human nature, which amply repays the value of every 
affection sacrificed to it. I shall, however, appear less cruel 
if followed to the end. 



158 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Ill examining, then, into tlie moral value of the two forms 
of love which we have distinguished above, we shall be led 
to the following reflections. 

241. It is feeling which constitutes reality. A real being 
as such, i. e., in so far as it is feeling, seeks only the real, 
is attracted by it alone, and cares to unite itself only with 
its like, i. e., with another real being. All these tendencies, 
or, as they may be called, affections, although blind, are not 
wrong so long as they keep within tlie sphere of feeling ; 
they are rather to be considered as having no moral charac- 
ter, and being neither virtuous nor vicious, neither merito- 
rious nor the reverse, though they have an eudemonological 
value. 

But when the intelligent human being, the moral person, 
assigns to them a value, they enter the sphere of morality. 
If the value assigned to them by the understanding be just, 
the person so judging them has performed a virtuous act ; if 
it be unjust, the act is blamable. What, tlien, is the just 
value which should be assigned to such affections? 

In themselves they have none at all, but, considered as 
elements of happiness, they have a value when they become 
the rewards of virtue. In this relation tliey become right 
and desirable even to the moral being. But how great is 
the danger lest they should be valued for themselves, inde- 
pendently of their relations to virtue ! This is one of the 
primary sources of human depravation. 

242. Leaving aside, then, the affections that spring solely 
from the senses and feelings, let us consider the morality 
of the rational love having for its object real being. 

In the first place, a finite reality, considered in itself, 
apart from any attributes, is impossible to conceive ; it is 
nothing, it presents no basis for our love. The infinite 
reality alone can be loved as such : that alone is. 

In the second place, the love of finite realities, on account 



MORALITY OF RATIONAL LOVE. 159 

of their good attributes and qualities, is certainly right ; ])ut 
it is love of the second kind, illumined by the ideal : a love 
which is not exclusive, but which expands to all objects in 
which it finds similar attributes and qualities : a love which 
is not unchangeable, for it grows and diminishes with them ; 
finally, a love which is not excessive, since it is measured by 
their value. The love which has for its object a reality like 
itself expends its whole force upon that. 

In the third place, between the love of the real in itself 
and the love of the ideal in the real, we find the love of 
beneficence and the love of gratitude which are also gov- 
erned by the idea. 

243. The love of beneficence is that which loves to pro- 
duce in its objects the good qualities and attributes wdiich it 
aims at. Its scope, tb-en, is moral, for it does not love the 
real for its own sake, but as the realization of those qualities 
which deserve to be loved. ^ 

The love of gratitude is bestowed on the beneficence of the 
person loved, and therefore terminates in the benefactor's 
good qualities. Moreover, it desires to return the benefits 
received, and this feeling is also moral ; for either it desires 
to produce or to perfect some good quality in the benefac- 
tor, or to bestow some eudemonological benefit upon him. 
The latter is a moral act ; for such a benefit bestowed out of 
gratitude is a benefit given on account of, and as a reward 
for, the good action whence came the benefit.^ 

In each of these cases the love of the real is not absent ; 
but, governed by the idea, it remains still the love of the 
idea realized, and, therefore, it is free and not confined 
or blind or exclusive. 

1 If beneficence aimed only at giving to the real being eudemonological bene- 
fits, without any reference to virtue, it would belong to the love of the real. 

2 In the love of gratitude there is, perhaps, always something of love of 
self, that is, of the real, which in this case is proud of becoming the minister 
of justice. 



160 ON THE KULING TRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

244. We have now seen what are the causes which narrow 
a child's affections and limit his benevolence. We may de- 
duce from them this most important rule of education : use 
every means to keep the benevolent affections in the child 
open, enlightened ; not exclusive, but universal. The science 
of education in relation to infancy will have reached its cul- 
minating point, when it has determined what those means 
are, whether negative, avoiding every occasion of limiting 
the child's affections, or positive, bringing him to bestow 
them universally and justly. 

We will say this only to mothers, nurses, and parents, that, 
if they fear to lose by this method something of the love 
they covet from their nui'slings, they could not make a greater 
mistake. The only result of it will be to change a love rest- 
ing on false grounds into a love resting on true ones ; an 
impetuous but inconstant love into a calm but everlasting 
one ; the exchange of some childish caresses for heartfelt 
respect, which, while it gives their children that moral dig- 
nity which is the highest attribute of man, will give to 
themselves the fullest assurance that they will receive from 
them in return zealous aid and support through all chances 
and changes while life lasts, and an honored memory after 
death. 

ARTICLE VIII. 

ACTS OF RELIGIOUS WOBSHIP WHICH THE CHILD SHOULD BEGIN TO PEBFOBM 

AT THIS AGE. 

245. The first and best of all positive means to foster and 
render universal and wise the benevolence of man from his 
tenderest years, is to turn his heart from infancy towards 
the source of his being, the Creator. 

God, comprehending in himself the whole of being whence 
everything that is is God loving all things, for he has made 
and is making them all, — God is the sum of all good to- 
wards which the heart of man tends, and therefore the love 



RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN INFANCY. 161 

of God contains implicitly the love ordained for all other 
tilings. Hence it is from this flame that benevolence is 
kindled, and derives at the same time its immense expan- 
sion and its governing principle. 

Tiiily it is in vain that Rousseau pretends that the worship 
of God is beyond the lisping of the infant tongue. On the 
contrary, the little child, as if nearer to its origin, seems to 
turn towards it with delight, to seek it with eagerness, and 
to find it more easily even than the adult ; and it belongs to 
God rather than to man to impart himself to the simple soul 
that knows nothing, yet understands its Maker. As was to 
be expected, the sophistical Genevese of the last century has 
been amply confuted in this and in his own country. ^ 

We have seen that the child at its third period already 
begins to conceive the idea of God ; it can, therefore, feel 
love for Ilim, or rather it cannot help loving Him. 

If, then, we consider that, for all who admit the existence 
of God, He is the bond which keeps the universe together, 
the reason, the beginning and the end of all things, the good 
of every good, the essential good, who does not see that this 
idea of God for all who are neither atheists nor utterly in- 
consistent, must govern, subordinate, and direct all others? 
Who does not see that from it alone human education can 
derive its unity, its principle, its guiding light, and not less 
that of children than of adults; of individuals than of 
society ; of. nations than of the whole human race.^ 

Let us, then, when we have taught the child the meaning 
of that word God, teach him at once to turn with all his 
infant affections towards Him. I have already shown that 

1 The reflections of Mad. Necker de Saussure on this subject are so full of 
beauty and sense, that I cannot leave it without pointing them out to the reader 
and urging him to read them in the original. See B. III. c. vii. of the work quoted 
above. 

2 See Sa(i(iln sulV unltd, delV educazione, «' Essay on the Unity of Education," 
in Vol. II. of this collection of Pedagogical works. 



162 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

man, in giving his heart to God, does not withdraw it from 
other things, since God is to be found in these also. He 
only sanctifies his affections, prevents any change in their 
nature, and makes them at once nobler and more enduring. 

246. Here I must say a word to Christian fathers and 
mothers : to any others my words would be iniintelligible, and 
for that reason intolerable : let those, then, close their ears 
whose feelings have not reached the height which truly 
Christian parents derive, not from nature, but from the 
word of the Highest. 

The law of God is a light unto the feet of the latter, and 
therefore they fear not to consult it. Let them see, then, 
how that law determines the affections of their children 
towards themselves and towards the Supreme Being. 

What does the law of God ordain towards the Supreme 
Being? Love: here are its words : "Thou shalt love the 
Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and 
with all thy mind."^ 

What does it ordain for children towards their parents ? 
Honor: here again are its words: "Honor thy father and 
thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which the 
Lord thy God hath given thee."^ 

Why is love thus reserved for God, and Jionor commanded 
towards parents ? What is the meaning of this distribution 
of the affections? 

The distribution made by this law is directly opposed to 
that made by nature ; for grace is in continual opposition 
to nature, being larger in its views and affections than 
nature, which surrounds itself with limitations that grace 
breaks through and removes. Nature thus inclines man to 
love his parents, and rather to honor his invisible Creator 
than to love him. 

247. But was it intended by the Divine law to condemn 

1 Matt. xxii. 37. 2 Exodus xx. 12. 



divinp: law of love. 163 

either the natural love of children towards their parents, or 
the honoring of God ? Assuredly not : it aims only at pre- 
serving naturrJ inclinations from being transformed and cor- 
rupted. To this end, it adds to the honor which natural 
reason suggests towards God, the counterbalancing precept 
to love Him ; and to the love felt for parents it adds and 
gives as a counterpoise the precept to honor them, More- 
over, to the honoring of God it adds and counterpoises the 
honoring of parents ; and to the love of parents it adds and 
counterpoises the love of God. Thus the natural affections, 
counterbalanced by the divine precepts, can be maintained 
free from excess or perversion. 

It must be remembered that what is natural does not re- 
quire to be commanded^ but only regiUated. Parents need 
have no fear as regards the love of their children : nature 
guarantees that, and it is only necessary to take care that 
they do not themselves check it by their own bad conduct. 
But let them (I am still addressing Christian parents) re- 
member also that what they have to fear is, not that the 
love of their children should be wanting, but that it should 
be excessive in one direction, and in another degenerate 
into sterile sentiment, which, springing from mere instinct, 
will yield later to a stronger instinct, — that of selfishness. 
They must guard against the first of these perils, which ren- 
ders the love of their children immoral, by strivins; to aive 
to God the larger place in their children's hearts, mindful of 
the Redeemer's words : "He who loves father or mother 
more than me is not worthy of me ; " ^ and of those others 
which show that, where they come into collision, God must be 
preferred to parents: "If any man come to me, and hate 
not his father and mother, ... he cannot be my disciple."^ 
They will guard themselves against the second peril, if they 
requh'e from the child the honor due to their authority, 

1 Matt. X. 37. a Luke xiv. 26, 27. 



164 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which is the source of reverential love, of obedience, and 
active service. All these are included in the law of God, 
and are a good exchange for mere sensual caresses.^ 

Love, then, towards parents is the better for bringing into 
it the honor commanded by the law of God : the latter deter- 
mines the quality and manner of it, — its seriousness and its 
activity. 

In the same way the honor paid to God is enhanced and 
determined by the command to love him also ; so that neither 
the love shall be purely external and material, nor the honor 
proceed merely from servile fear of overwhelming power, but 
shall be honor informed with love and full of a confident 
hope, — the worship, in spirit and in truth, of the true wor- 
shippers, who, seeking to do the will of God, find it in doing 
whatsoever they can to benefit their parents and all other 
human beings. ' 

Let me, then, be permitted to affirm that every usurpation 
turns against those who commit it, and, hence, that the most 
affectionate Christian parents should watch over themselves, 
— a counsel perhaps never given to them before, — lest, in 
usurping that final love of theu* children which is due to God 
only, they should lose tliat which is legitimately due to them- 
selves, and which the law of God assigns to them. 

248. To return to the infant : It is evident that its faculty 
of worship must be in proportion to the development of its 
knowledge of the Supreme Being. The extent of the latter 
at that age has already been pointed out (181-182). The 
worship corresponding to it should be of the simplest kind ; 
nothing more than a feeling of love expressed in words. 
Adoration which, as well as homage and thanksgiving, in- 

1 St. Paul, commenting on the foiirth connnandment, places obedience as the 
first element of the honor to be given to parents (children, obey your parents in 
the Lord^ for this is right. Honor thy father and thy mother, etc. Ephes. vi. 1, 2), 
and Christ, explaining that commandment, declares that tlie honor commanded 
towards them includes supporting them in their need. (Matt. xv. 5.) 



CULTIVATION OF RELIGIOUS FAMILY. 165 

volves more complex feelings and conceptions, belongs with 
them to a later period. 

I think it important also to give time for the sufficient 
development of the grand idea of God in the infant mind, 
before surrounding it with accessory ideas and other religious 
doctrines. The child's tliought should be concentrated on 
the majesty of the Supreme Being ; when he has arrived at 
a deep feeling of that, when the thougiit of God and his 
attributes has attained dominion over him, then it will prove 
a thoroughly solid foundation on which all other religious 
ideas can be built up, — a centre round which they will gather ; 
religion will then rise up, as a majestic temple, iu the soul 
of man. 



SECTION IV. 

ON THE COGNITIONS OF THE THIRD ORDER AND THE 
CORRESPONDING EDUCATION. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE FOURTH PERIOD OF CHILDHOOD, AND THE DIFFERENCE BE- 
TWEEN THE PERIOD AND THE ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 

249. The order of cognitions marks a fixed epoch in the 
mind : with his first cognition of a given order tlie child 
enters into a new intellectual condition ; an immense field is 
opened before him, in which he might roam without find- 
ing a limit, even were he unable to rise beyond that order to 
a higher one. 

But when we try to determine the precise period at which 
the mind passes from one order to another, we are met by 
extreme difficulties. In the first place, all children do not 
reach these intellectual stages at the same age, and even to 
determine the moment of their attainment in any individual 
child would be excessively difficult, both because we cannot 
be sure that the passage from the one to the other will take 
place within our observation, and because, even if it did, it 
might easily escape us. The first step taken by the child in 
a new order of cognitions may be so slight as not to be de- 
tected, and, again, the analysis of these mental processes 
demands from the educator vastly more time and sagacity 
than are needed by the child in his rapid passage from the one 
to the other. It would, therefore, be impossible in a treatise 
on method to determine precisely the time at which each 
successive period begins and ends, and yet we believe that 
an endeavor to fix them approximately may not be without 
its use. 



DIVISION OF PERIODS. .167 

250. Even this is a matter of difRculty which we could 
venture upon only on the strength of such experience of 
children as we have gained, and in the hope that the experi- 
ence of others will come to correct and complete the task 
which we are, perhaps, the first to undertake. 

We shall begin by indicating the principle we have fol- 
lowed, and which we shall adhere to in dividing the periods. 
The passage from the one to the other not occurring at the 
same age in all children, we shall try to ascertain the time 
when it generally takes place, taking as its sign some act of 
intelligence common in childhood, but indubitably belonging 
to a certain order of cognitions. Thus we have assigned the 
end of the sixth week as the beginning of the second period of 
infancy, that being the time when the infant generally begins 
to smile back at its mother, thereby giving the first certain 
sign of intelligence. We have assigned the beginning of the 
third period to the close of the first year, because children 
generally begin to speak at that time, and speech is an act 
which belongs undoubtedlv to the second order of coonitions. 
By the same rule we shall assign the beginning of the fourth 
period of which we are now about to treat to the end of the 
second year, for in their third year children can generallv 
learn to read, as reading is an act whych belongs to the third 
order of cognitions. 

251. In this method of division it will be seen: (1) that 
we take as our rule the order of coojnition as markinor the 
limits of each period ; (2) that this rule cannot be applied 
in fixing the time except approximately. 

Hence, when we say that the third period of childhood 
begins with the second year of age, and the fourth with 
the third year, we do not for a moment mean to assert 
that a child has formed no cognitions of the second order 
before reaching his second year, but only that we take no 
notice of them because they are not generallv observable 



168 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

at that age. In the same manner, when we fix the 
beginning of the fourth period at the third 3'ear, we by 
no means assert that a child cannot earlier than that attain 
some cognitions of the third order ; but we first make men- 
tion of tliem at that time because then cognitions of the 
third order commonW appear in children so unequivocally 
as not easily to escape observation. 

We beg the reader to note this explanation once for all, 
and to apply it as we go on through each successive period 
of life remaining to be considered. 

CHAPTER II. 

ON THE MENTAL PROGRESS MADE AT THAT AGE WITH RE- 
GARD TO THE COGNITIONS OF THE PRECEDING ORDERS 
AND THE CONCOMITANT DEVELOPMENT OF THE OTHER FAC- 
ULTIES. 

252. Even should the child pass through his third year 
without rising to a new order of cognitions, the development 
of his faculties would still go on, although they must remain 
within the limits assigned by the previous order. There 
would be : (1) an increase in the number of cognitions be- 
longing to the previous orders ; (2) the cognitions them- 
selves would become more accurate, by being repeated and 
impressed upon the mind ; they would draw out greater 
power of attention, and become inerged in that universal feel- 
ing which they always occasion, and which is the source of 
fresh activity. 

Progress along these two lines of number and accuracy 
takes place in each order of cognitions, and this fact must 
never be lost sight of in following out the course of human 
development. We point it out here, once for all, leaving it 
to the reader to apply it at each period to all the cognitions 
of the preceding orders. 



CLASSIFICATION OF COGNITIONS. 169 

The active faculties of the wilt are developed iiari passu 
with the passive faculties of the understanding, and, simul- 
taneously with both, all the animal faculties, which all tend 
to form habits of various strength and quality. 

CHAPTER HI. 

ON THE COGNITIONS OF THE THIRD ORDER. 

ARTICLE I. 
WHAT ARE THE COGNITIONS OF THE THIRD ORDER IN GENERAL? 

253. As the cognitions of the second order are those 
that have for their object the relations between cognitions of 
the first order, and between these and the feelings which pre- 
cede cognitions of the second order, ^ so, likewise, the cog- 
nitions of the third order have for their object the relations 
between those of the second, or whatever thoughts and feel- 
ings the human being has experienced prior to the second. 

The cognitions of the second order, then, may be classed 
under two heads : 

Class I. Cognitions of the second order which have for 
their objects the relations between the cognitions of the first 
order. 

Class II. Cognitions of the second order which have for 
their object the relations of the cognitions of the first order 
with the feelings existing in man. 

254. The cognitions of the third order being reached by 
the mind through reflection on those of the second order, 
become somewhat more complex, and may be divided into 
the following classes : 

1 Under the terra feelinr/s I include the action of all the faculties of the human 
mind, so far as that action is, as I have shown, always joined to a feeling. There 
is is a difficulty in understanding this conjunction of feelhig- and cognition, be- 
cause it is difficult to form a clear conception of the unity of the human subject, 
on which conception, however, depends the explanation of all those facts in which 
the sensitive and intellectual elements are combined. 



170 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

I. Those which have for their object the relations^ be- 
tween cognitions of the second order. ^ 

(^1.) Relations between the first class of cognitions of 
the second order. 

(B.) Relations between the second class of cognitions 
of the second order. 

(0.) Relations between the cognitions of the first class 
and those of the second class, always of the second order. 

II. Class of cognitions of the third order : those which 
have for their object the relations of the cognitions of the 
second order with those of the first. 

(A.) Relations of the first class of cognitions of the 
second with those of the first order. 

{B.) Relations of the second class of cognitions of the 
second with cognitions of the first order. 

III. Class of cognitions of the third order : those which 
have for their object the relations of the cognitions of the 
second order with tlie feelings preceding them. 

(^1.) Relations of the first class of cognitions of the 
second order with antecedent feelings. 

(B.) Relations of the second class of cognitions of the 
second order with antecedent feelings. 

This tal)le shows that the number of classes of" the cogni- 
tions of the tliird order has already reached to seven ; no 
slight proof of the immensity of human thought, and of the 
Ial)yrinth which has to be threaded by those who would in- 
vestigate it and trace its limits. 

1 It must 1)e always understood that these are the immediate relations, per- 
ceived l)y a single additional act of reflection. 

2 The expression relations between the cof/nitions is used for brevity; but it 
nuist be understood to mean the relations between the objects of the cognitions. 
It is true that tlie mind can reflect on all the objects of its cognitions as well as on 
the cognitions themselves ; but the latter, considere<i as acts of the subject, come 
under the head of feelings ; when they are afterwards perceived intellectually 
they become the objects of the cognitions: hence the cognitions reflected upon are 
classed either undev /eeHnys or under objects of other cognitions. 



EXAMPLE OF CLASSIFICATION. 171 

255. As it would take too long to give an example of each 
of the seven classes, I will restrict myself to giving one only 
of the last, — that in which the acts of the human mind are 
most complicated. 

When the various sensations I receive from a rose come 
to me through my several organs of sense, I form at the 
same time an intellectual perception of the rose (first order 
of cognitions) . Supposing that during the night I become 
conscious of the scent of a rose, I can argue from the scent 
to the existence of the rose close by : a process of reasoning 
which I accomplish by reflecting on the relation between the 
odoriferous sensation and my past perception of the rose, 
and this belongs to cognitions of the second order (second 
class). If I goon reflecting on the rose, the existence of 
which I have inferred, and argue from it that, if a rose is 
there, it has thorns which would prick me should I attempt 
to grasp it, I shall form a cognition of the third grade, and 
of the last class in that order, because I join by reflection 
the invisible rose (cognition of the second order) with a 
feeling in me, i. e. that of pain. 

ARTICLE II. 

METHOD WE SHALL FOLLOW HENCEFORTH IN THE EXPOSITION OF HUMAN 

DEVELOPMENT. 

256. It would be an endless task to follow out all the 
classes into which the third grade of cognitions can be 
divided, not to speak of the succeeding grades. We shall 
not attempt to cover so vast a field, useful as it might be, 
but, leaving it to those who come after us, we shall, in order 
to keep within the scope of this work, follow henceforward, 
in tracing out the gradations of man's intellectual devel- 
opment, a simpler but regular plan, leading us to the method 
best suited to our purpose. 

In the first place, we shall begin, in dealing with each order 



172 ON THE liULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

of cognitions, by carefully marking out the various classes 
into which it is divided, so as to place before the reader a 
ground-plan, giving the extent of the order and the limits 
and A^arying complexity of each of the cognitions belonging 
to it. Afterwards, leaving aside this sketch of the larger 
field of research, we shall consider as a whole the cognitions 
of that order according to the following plan : 

Firsts we shall take the j^J'ocesses of the mind by which the 
cognitions of the order in question are arrived at : then we 
shall take the objects of those processes, i. e., of the things 
we have succeeded in knowing through them. 

Second, as regards the objects known, these must be 
either elementary ideas''- common to all forms of knowledge, 
or they must belong to one or other of our three supreme 
categories, under which must fall all the things that are or 
that can be thought. 

To sum up : the following scheme will lay before the 
reader the method we shall pursue in treating of each order 
of cognitions, and he will find it no small advantage to keep 
it before him, as a map on which to follow the road we go 
over. 

A. Processes by which the mind arrives at cognitions of a given 
order. 

B. Objects of these intellectual processes. 

I. Common objects or elementary ideas. 
II. Categorical objects, that is : 

1. Real and ideal. 

2. Moral. 

1 The elementary ideas are those wliich are contained in the idea of being, the 
most universal of all. See Neiv Essay, No. 575 and foil. 



SYNTHETIC AND ANALYTIC JUDGMENTS. 173 

ARTICLE III. 

PROCESSES BY WHICH THE MIND ARRIVES AT COGNITIONS OF THE THIRD 

ORDER. 

Section 1. — Cognitions of the third order are always reached through synthetic 
judgments : laiv by lohich synthetic and analytic judgments constantly suc- 
ceed each other in the mind. 

257. At this period of childhood the processes for which 
the mind is fitted are synthetiG judgments.^ 

And, in fact, the child arrived at this period, having 
formed in his mind abstractions from sensible things, such 
as color, taste, or, at any rate, sensible pleasure or pain, is 
capable of using these abstractions as so many predicates 
added to a subject, and can therefore at sight of a certain 
kind of food, say " this is good " or " this is bad." 

Let us note here carefully the march of the child's 
mind. 

I have elsewhere ^ confuted Kant's a irriori synthetic 
judgments. At the same time, I have myself admitted an 
a priori synthetic judgment, but only one, which I have 
termed the primitive synthesis or perception. I have de- 
clared to be a priori that earliest of all judgments by which 
man affirms to himself "something exists," because in that 
the predicate is existence^ which is not derived from experi- 
ence, but which is an intuition through an inward act of the 
mind. This a priori synthetic judgment is the process cor- 
responding to the first order of cognitions. 

But so soon as the mind has perceived things, it forms 

1 Synthetic, that is, combining judgments, are those in which the mind having 
the conception of something which may be a common predicate, applies it, in fact, 
to that which we feel or perceive ; in other words, we predicate it of some object 
although it does not belong to our conception of that object. For example : when 
we say "this food is good," we form. i\, synthetic jiulgment, hec^w&Q the predicate 
"good" which we attach to our conception of the food forms no part of it, for 
the food might be bad. * 

2 See Ntiv Essay, Nos. 342-352. 



174 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

analytical judgments ^ on its perceptions and on the memory 
of these perceptions ; that is to say, it decomposes both. 

25S. There are two modes in which the decomposition of 
perceptions takes place ; the first is the natural mode by , 
which the mind contemplates the simple idea of the thing, 
without attending to the judgment regarding its subsistence. 
This decomposition of the idea of the judgment concerning 
subsistence, which takes place naturally, is not an analytical 
judgment, for it is not a judgment at all ; the subsistence 
and the idea are two heterogenous things which naturally 
come apart : the mind simply directs its attention rather to 
one than the other of two things which are naturally sepa- 
rate. The second mode of decomposition is an artificial 
process applied to imaginal ideas, from which some one of 
their elements is subtracted, and this process is a true ana- 
lytical judgment, because it is an actual decomposition of 
one idea into several. This is accomplished, as we have 
seen, by the aid of language ; and under this aspect lan- 
guages are entitled to the name of analytical methods, given 
them by Condillac. Such is the process which corresponds 
to the second order of cognitions. 

It is evident that the human mind, in going through 
this process, acquires new predicates. Primarily it pos- 
sesses only that one, innate in the mind, of existence, which 
enabled it to form its primary synthetic judgments. These 
supplied the material for the analytical judgments which 
followed, and the latter again furnished the mind with new 
predicates, which being combined with more and more sub- 
jects enabled it to form new S3mthetical judgments. Thus, 
for example, if I already know what is sensibly good or 

1 Analytical or dividing judgments are those by which we decompose the 
object perceived into its several parts. For example, when we say « f ood is 
anything that is eaten," we express an analytical judgment, because in the 
conception of food are united the two conceptions of "something" and "eat- 
able," which in the above proposition are divided. 



SYNTHETIC JUDGMENT CONTINUED. 175 

bad, I can, on seeing a kind of food exactly similar in 
appearance to one I have formerly found agreeable to m}^ 
palate, join the predicate good to the object I see, and pro- 
nounce the following synthetic judgment: "this is good," 
or "this which I am looking at is good." 

259. "We must be careful not to confound the synthetic 
judgment by which I pronounce "this is good," with the 
purely sensible apprehension which is manifested alike by 
the lower animals, and which arises from the association 
between their various sensations. If the dog trembles with 
eagerness at the mere sight of the food which he cannot yet 
seize upon, he does not pronounce a judgment ; but the sight 
of the food revives the phantasm of the pleasant taste he 
has before experienced, which again excites his desire and 
corresponding action.^ No judgment is pronounced except 
by a being capable of having an intuition of a predicate 
by itself (abstract) , and then of joining it to a subject, i. e. 
of seeing the said predicate in a subject. The second series 
of synthetical judgments belongs, therefore, to the third 
order of cognitions. Before going further, it may be useful 
to point out here the universal law of human development, 
which is this : The synthetic and the analytic judgments 
alternate with each other in such manner that, if we dispose 
in a series the various orders of cognitions, we shall find the 
uneven numbers of the series composed of so many files of 
synthetic judgments, and the even numbers of as many files 
of analytical judgments. 

That this must be the course of things is manifest from 
the fact that we can decompose only what we have previ- 
ously put together. Hence composition must be followed by 
decomposition^ and the latter by recomposition^ and so on 



1 All these phenomena in animals which have the appearance of reasoning 
have been explained by me in Book II. of the Authropologt/, through the laws of 
pure animality, which, so far as I am aware, has not t>eeu done before. 



176 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ill continual alternation. Those orders of cognition, then, 
which are formed through composition or synthesis, give 
to the mind new subjects to analyze, and those formed by 
decomposition or analysis, enrich the mind with ever new 
predicates^ which are capable of being synthesized, i. e. 
joined to other subjects. 

Section 2. — What is contributed by analytical judgments to the third order of 

cognitions. 

2G0. Together with the synthetic judgments proper to the 
fourth period, the child continues also to use cinalysis. 

It has been already pointed out tliat the mental processes 
which begin in the earlier periods continue in the later ones 
without interruption, only increasing in number and com- 
pleteness (252) , and thereby complicating more and more 
the course of human development. To this must be added 
that each period brings fresh material for analysis and 
abstraction, because the analysis of thought is ever at work 
decomposing all things, and thus decomposes again the 
results of previous decompositions. There is assuredly in 
thought the same infinite divisibility as in the decomposi- 
tion of matter, which shows how vain are the efforts of 
those logicians who would try to reduce the knowable to 
absolutely elementary ideas. 

Another consequence follows from this, ^. e., that, although 
analysis belongs to the second order of cognitions, yet some 
of its products are proper to the third, and could not appear 
earlier. This applies equally to all the following higher 
orders of cognition, so that, at each intellectual stage, analy- 
sis contributes something proper to itself. 

261. The first abstractions made by the child are those 
of the sensible qualities of things, — their felt pleasantness 
or unpleasantness. These qualities are, in fact, only effects 
produced by things on our faculty of feeling. It is natural 
that the child should, at first, attend only to what it feels, 



CONCEPTION OF ACTION. ' 177 

for what it does not feel has as yet uo existence for it. 
But, so soon as it is able to bring into harmony the 
sensations derived from its various organs, to receive the 
one as the forerunner of another, to expect the latter be- 
cause it has received the former, etc., it arrives little by 
little at directing attention to the actions of things, at 
abstracting their action from the things, always by means 
of language, that is, by means of the verbs which exactly 
mark the action of things. 

Let me again quote here a mother's observations on the 
mode by which the child, through the use of language, 
arrives at forming abstractions of actions : — 

"It would certainly seem easy to understand how the child 
learns to name material objects. When they have been shown to 
him, certain sounds being uttered at the same time, the thing re- 
calls the idea of the word, and the word that of the thing. But it 
is more difficult to understand how he comes to attach a sign to 
that which has no corporeal existence. The act mis, for instance, 
which are always expressed or supposed by verbs, have no perma- 
nent tj^pe in nature.i They do not fall under the senses of the 
child as he names them, and he says ' go, ' when as yet there is 
no sign of going. He must have within him the idea expressed 
by the verb, and apply this idea, which is at once clear and elastic, 
successively to all that belongs to action. How, then, has he con- 
ceived a notion of this kind which seems one of the most subtle of 
abstractions? It would seem that he has derived it from gestures, 
actions being the natural objects of pantomime, which may be 
called the language of action. We use much unconscious gesticu- 
lation with children, and thus they learn to gesticulate themselves 
a great deal. Hence, when a certain word always accompanies 
certain movements,^ the two ideas become connected in their minds 

1 Hence, when they are named, it is by an abstraction ; to tcalL; for example, 
is not a special act of walking done by some man once, but to rralJc in general, to 
walk as men commonly do, though each time they walk it will be differently from 
the time before. 

2 These movements being always different and varied, we require an abstrac- 
tiou to fix them in our minds with a type common to all. 



178 * ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

" It is true that words which are verbs to us are not always so to 
them. Thus, to drink means to them water or milk ; to go oiU icalk- 
i?ig, the open air or the door. But as soon as they begin to require 
that the action should follow the word, the action assumes a greater 
consistency in their minds, and they end by really attaching the 
sign to it. Children, like negroes, at first use only the infinitive. 
Not having yet formed any idea of time, and not understanding- 
pronouns till much later, they are reduced to the infinitive mood." ^ 

These observations are full of truth, and of rare saga- 
city. 

Section 3. — Catatheiical' Ratiocination at this period. 

262. The synthetical judgments of this period are the 
result of a catathetical ratiocination, performed by the child's 
mind. For example, when the child judges to be good the 
food he sees preparing for him, he conceives in his little 
brain a discourse, which, if it were put into propositions, 
would assume this form : ' ' What I now see is like what I 
saw before ; but what I saw before was pleasant to my taste 
and my stomach ; therefore, this which I see now is pleasant 
for my taste and my stomach." The child is quite unable to 
express such propositions ; but their substance undoubtedly 
passes through his mind. 

But, although the child, at the age we are speaking of, is 
capable of catathetical reasoning, and thus of rising to the 
third order of cognitions, he is as yet incapable of conceiv- 
ing hypothetical or disjunctive reasoning, because both these 
forms require that the major premiss shall be composed of 
two predicates compared with each other, of which the one 

1 Mad. Necker de Saiissure, L. II., c. vi. 

2 "We call those catathetical judgments, or jiuloments of position, those in 
which the major premiss is absolute, without any conditional expressed or implied. 
Others have called such reasonings categorical ; but we have been oblified to de- 
part from this nomenclature for the sake of clearness of expression, and have 
reserved the word categorij to signify a division of things wide enough to include 
genera, as will be seen more clearly in the Ontology. 



REALITY AND IDEALITY. " 179 

implies or excludes the other. Now, he possesses ^9?'edi- 
cates indeed, but to compare them and discover the relation 
between them requires a higher order of cognitions, as we 
shall see in the following sections. 

ARTICLE IV. 
OBJECTS OF THE COGNITIONS OF THE THIRD ORDER. 

Section \.— Reality and Ideality A 
(A.) Collections, numbers. 

263. What, then, are the objects which man comes to know 
through the processes indicated as belonging to the third 
order? We will point out some of the principal classes of 
such objects: — first the real, then the ideal, and, finally, 
the moral. Let us begin witli the first. 

Among real objects, we must first examine the progress 
made by the mind in the conception of collections. 

The sensistic and the Scotch schools confounded together 
abstractions and collective ideas, which are entirely different.^ 
Abstractions form the basis of collections, but are not collec- 
tions. I could not haA^e the idea of a flock of sheep, if I had 
not first the abstract idea of a sheep, to which each sheep 
in the flock conformed ; for a collection is only a multiplicity 
of things like each other in certain respects. 

264. Let us see, then, by what steps the mind arrives at 
the conception of collections. 

On first seeing several things together, or feeling them 
simultaneously, the child forms no idea of collection or plu- 
ralitv or difference. Grantino; that his understandino; arrives 
at pe7'cej)tio7i, and, consequently, that such sensations do not 
remain mere sensible phenomena, it does not follow that he 
derives from them at first the above-mentioned conceptions 

1 It seems to me well to speak of these two catejz;ories of objects together 
rather than separately, on account of their close relation to each other, 
■ 2 See A^ezf Essay, nos. 142 and foil. 



180 ON THE EULING PEINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

of multiplicity, etc. All that can be said is, that, when the 
child sees two things before him, he has a different percep- 
tion from that which he has when he sees only one. It 
does not follow that the child distinguishes, in the first case, 
two objects ; in the second, only one ; he distinguishes only 
two different perceptions, which he is as yet unable to ana- 
lyze. Multiplicity is conceived only when we can distinguish 
and separate the units which compose it ; but when these 
units are perceived at once, and, according to the expression 
of the Schools, per modum unius^ the mind gains no con- 
ception of collections. The difference between the percep- 
tion of an object and the perception of several objects was 
what deceived Bonnet into believing he had grounds for 
stating that ideas of collections are formed, by the action 
of sensible objects on our organs, as, according to his 
belief, our simple ideas are also formed.-^ We, on the 
contrary, while granting that the impression received by the 
child's organs at the sight of a flock of sheep is widely 
different from that which he receives from the sight of a 
single sheep, entirely den}' that the difference consists in 
the former's corresponding to a collective idea, and the 
latter's to the idea of a single thing : both are simple 
impressions, the one more varied than the other, but not 
conveying as yet to the mind any true idea of collection. 

This error of Bonnet's proves that he was unacquainted 
with the true nature of collective ideas, and did not think it 
necessary to investigate it. Having observed the difference of 
the impression made by collections of things, from that made 
by a single thing, he concluded that the nature of the collec- 
tive idea consisted simply in that difference of impression. 

The system of sensistic philosophy could not preserve 
Bonnet from this error ; for, as that s^^stem makes no essen- 
tial separation between sensation and cognition, it was im- 

1 See Essai Analytique sur les facultes de Vdme, §§ 201, 205, 214. 



COLLECTIVE AND ABSTRACT NOTIONS. 181 

possible for him to perceive that the understanding does not 
take in at once all that the sensation contains, but arrives at 
it little by little. We have seen ^ that the understanding at 
first perceives only the resistance of body, whence it dis- 
covers entity ; and only afterwards attends to the sensible 
qualities of the entity, which for a long while remain in 
the sense only, — felt indeed, but not cognized by the subject. 
Moreover, we have seen that the understanding, in each of 
its acts, perceives as little as possible; that is, it perceives 
only so much, and no more, of the sensible object, as it is 
constrained to perceive by its immediate need, — which is 
the stimulus that awakens and spurs it on to action. Even 
if the two sensations of a collection of things and a simple 
thing could give the material out of which the understand- 
ing might form the idea of collection and the idea of unity, 
it would b}^ no means follow that it would in fact soon form 
such ideas ; it will form them when the intelligent subject 
feels the want of them, and not a moment sooner. It is 
in any case the duty of the philosopher to describe all the 
processes of the understanding, in working out and putting 
together ideas from the material furnished to it by the senses. 
This, then, is what we have to investigate. 

265. To begin with : the analysis of the idea of a collec- 
tion gives these certain results: (1) that such idea presup- 
poses in the mind of the child that possesses it the knowl- 
edge of what a unit is ; (2) that the child also knows that 
several units are gathered together in the same place (to 
take only collections of the simplest kind). This second 
contains a third, ^. e., the likeness in certain respects of the 
units forming the collection ; for no collection can be formed 
of things entirely and totally different.^ 

1 See above, where we have spoken of the successive improvement which takes 
place in the intellectual perceptions (nos. 104 and foil.) 

2 That we are always able to conceive a collection of several things arises from 



182 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

It is not to be assumed that the conception of unity in its 
abstract form, as expressed by the word, enters early into 
the mind of the child. Ideal unity exists implicitly in 
entity^ which is given in the natural light of the mind, 
and, therefore, the child supposes and adopts it, but with- 
out giving any attention to it, simply because he does not 
want such a lofty abstraction. Nevertheless, when he hears 
the words, one thing, two things, — and here language again 
comes to his aid, — he learns after a while that the two 
things are the same thing repeated. To pronounce mentally 
the following judgment : These things which I see are two, 
is a complicated operation. We may consider it first as an 
analysis of the single sensible impression which represents 
the two objects. The mind goes back to that impression, 
perceives it, and distinguishes in it one object from the other. 
But, in order to do this, the mind must have heard the com- 
mon name of the two objects, let us say pear, must have 
heard it applied to both the one and the other, and must 
have understood that this name expresses what is common 
to both. The common quality of the two objects must be 
associated with that name, and, therefore, must have been 
abstracted from the individuals. Even then it cannot be 
said that the mind has succeeded in forming the judgment : 
These are two objects. — because the common quality, asso- 
ciated with the name, is one and does not suppose a duality ; 
and the circumstance that it has been deduced from several 
objects does not necessitate retaining in the mind the plural- 
ity of the objects, each one of which may have left the im- 
pression of its common element, without the mind's having 
considered them together and noted their numerical relation. 
But when the child, having already in his mind, on the one 

their being always alike, at least, in their universal aspect, as things, entities. 
.Nevertheless, I think an idea and a thing could not together form any plurality 
or any collection, because they differ from each other categorically. 



COGNITION OF NUMBERS. 183 

hand, the common quality associated with the name, say of 
jpear, and, on the otlier, hears repeatedly the words, one 
pear, two pears, and sees these objects before him, he ends 
by attaching a meaning to the words one and two, and by 
fixing his attention on the unity and on the quality of the 
pears. 

If we consider this succession of processes by which the 
mind arrives at conceiving the duality of objects, we shall 
easily perceive that such a conception is not possible for it 
until it has reached the third grade of cognitions. And, in 
fact, the perception of abstract quality belongs, as we have 
seen, to the second grade. To reflect on the numerical rela- 
tion between the objects having the same abstract quality is 
manifestly a further step in reflection, i.e., a cognition of 
the third grade. 

266. Here it will be best that we should point out how 
the mind passes to the conception of the numbers beyond 
two. For although, as requiring the passage to higher and 
higher orders of cognition, it would seem to belong rather to 
the following sections, yet I think the argument will be 
made clearer if we put together here all that belongs to the 
cognition of numbers. 

It is evident that, for the numbers three, four, five, etc., 
the same process has in part to be gone through as for the 
conception of two. We always require the words which 
shall fix the trinity of things, the quarternity, etc. More- 
over, we cannot go on to number three objects, till we have 
previously numbered two, or form the conception of four 
unless we have first conceived three. This shows that each 
number belongs to a higher order of cognition,^ so that the 
mind is forced to pass through as many grades of cognition 

1 Aristotle says that one number diifers from another specifically. I think that 
he held this opinion, which was also adopted by the Schoolmen, on this ground, 
that the different numbers cannot be classed as belonging to the same grade of 
cognition, although he had not clearly apprehended this truth. 



184 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

as there are numbers of which it is able to form a distinct 
idea. I say ' a distinct idea,' for it is b}^ no means to be 
assumed that man has a distinct idea of every number the 
name of which he pronounces. Who has any distinct idea 
of a million, or even of a thousand? I believe, on the con- 
trary, that we must descend to an extremely small number, 
to find one of which men, even educated ones, form a dis- 
tinct idea of their own, unassisted by some general formula. 
267. And, in fact, I believe it would be impossible for 
men even to name the very high numbers, if there were no 
other way of arriving at the conception of them than the 
one we have pointed out, i. e., by analyzing the perception 
received from collections of objects, enumerating the dis- 
tinct units in them, and then noting the relation of the 
second unit to the first, of the third to the first two, of the 
fourth to the first three, and so on, through all the orders of 
collection to which the numbers belong. The mind, instead, 
helps itself by the use of general formulag, which, though 
they cannot give the distinct idea proper to a given number, 
give, at least, the idea of a relation between an unknown 
number and a known one, and the knowledge of these rela- 
tions is sufficient to give implicitly the idea of the former, 
because it gives the elements b}- the use of which we can 
find it. For instance, — if I do not know the number 1000 
in itself, but know that it is equal to 10 times 100, 1 know it 
implicitly through my knowledge of 10 and 100. So, again 
!" I do not know the number 100, but know that it is 10 
times 10, I have implicitly the knowledge of 100, in my 
knowledge of 10 and its relation to 100. Or if I do not 
know 10 by itself, but yet know that it is twice 5, I know 
it implicitly through my knowledge of 2 and 5 and their 
relation to 10. If, finally, I did not know 5, but yot knew 
that it is a number composed of twice 2 plus 1, 1 should have 
the implicit knowledge of it in my knowledge of 1 and 2 and 



COGNITION OF NUMBERS. 185 

the relation between them. Hence, if I know 1 and 2 and 
the relations above mentioned between the other numbers, I 
should say that my knowledge of 1 and 2 is proper and 
distinct ; but that my knowledge of the other numbers is, 
on the contrary, implicit and expressed in fonnulce. 

From this example it will be easily seen that the mind 
arrives much more rapidly at the knowledge of numbers 
through formulae than at the proper and distinct knowledge 
of each number by itself, since, by the method described, it 
arrives, through four stages of reflection, at the knowledge 
of 1000, whereas to attain to a distinct and proper knowledge 
of it would require a thousand stages of reflection, — a thing 
almost impossible to man. 

Now the science of the relations of numbers is arithmetic, 
and hence it is the one which prepares the way for the child's 
advance in the knowledge of numbers. 

268. It may, perhaps, be asked : What is the first formula 
found by the child for its advance in the numerical scale, 
and to what order does it belong? The following is my 
view of it. 

Let us go back to our collective perception : The child 
having already mastered the knowledge of one and two, sees, 
say, a detachment of thirty-two soldiers : the simplest way by 
which he can manage, if not to count, at least to go over 
their number, and divide them one from the other, will be 
as follows : 

His perception of the detachment is, in the first place, a 
single one ; but he is already capable of fixing his attention 
on one of the soldiers. He becomes aware that the detach- 
ment is not a single soldier ; for he sees, besides the one 
soldier he has distinctly observed, something else which he 
calls two. But this two resembles rather his perception of 
the whole detachment than the one soldier he has considered 
apart. He can thus repeat the operation, taking another 



186 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

soldier from the group that remains, and so on, taking each 
time one soldier from the remainder, till he has gone through 
the whole number. After all, he does not yet know the num- 
ber of the soldiers ; but he has gone over them one by one ; 
he has always had two objects present to him ; he has learned 
that one and two can be repeated as often as he chooses, and 
this is a new and important piece of knowledge to him. If 
he likes to carry on his reflections, he can form two groups 
of soldiers, and then two more out of these, and so on till 
he finds the relation of 2 to 32, or, if he expressed the idea 
of 32 through the number 2 only, his formula would be 
2x2x2x2x2 equal 32. 

269. It is easy to see, from this example, how great a step 
is the number 2 for the infant mind, since that number is 
the basis of all numeration and primitive arithmetic, — every 
number whatsoever being composed of 1 and 2, and their 
combinations once or twice repeated. 

This importance of the number 2 in human knowledge 
explains, if I mistake not, why, in the oldest languages, there 
is a special termination for the d^ial, which is not confounded 
with the plural, as in modern languages. It is true that the 
dual in those ancient languages is applied mostly to those 
objects which are naturally pairs, as the eyes, the lips, the 
hands, the feet, the millstones, etc. ; but this itself shows 
the special attention given by the primitive mind to double 
things, and how, when it has learned from them the number 
two, the door is open for all other numbers which it com- 
prised indefinitely under a common plural termination. 

(B.) First Definite Principles drawn from the Ideas of Things. 

270. Another product of the intellectual processes in the 
child's mind at this age is that of the primary definite princi- 
ples which it acquires, and of which it makes use in forming 
judgments. 



FIRST PRINCIPLES. " 187 

We must first understand clearly what is a principle or 
rule of judgment : it is no other than an idea applied by 
means of a judgment.-^ When, on seeing an object, I pro- 
nounce it to be a plant, I apply the idea of the plant to the 
object I see, and my judgment is simply a proposition in 
which I affirm that I have found in the object seen that which 
I contemplated in the idea. The idea of the plant is the 
standard which I follow in forming my judgment. 

This being ascertained, it follows that there are as many 
principles as ideas ; ^ and the principles are wide or narrow, 
exactly as the ideas of which they are the application. 

271. Man, human nature, is formed by one idea only 
(the intuition of being). If he had none, he would not be 
an intelligent being ; for the act characteristic of intelligence 
is judgment, and judgment is only the application of an idea. 
When, therefore, the human being begins to use his intelli- 
gence in forming his first judgments, he can form them only 
by the one idea he possesses, — that of existence ; hence, 
before judging anything else, he judges that a thing exists, 
he affirms its existence. 

When he pronounces intellectually the existence of a real 
thing, applying to it an idea (intellectual perception) , that 
idea serves as his principle. From his earliest intellectual 
acts, then, man has in his mind a principle by which he can 
pronounce a judgment ; for every judgment presupposes a 
standard which is applied in judging. 

Nevertheless, this principle by which man judges that real 
things exist (perception) is an indefinite and unlimited prin- 
ciple, for it can be applied equally to all real, sensible things, 
and it is this indefiniteness that distinguishes it from the 

1 This definition of principles is of the utmost importance. We have ah-eady 
laid it down in tlie New Essay, nos. 57G and foil. 

2 It must be remembered, as I have so often said and proved, that all ideas are 
universal. Ideas must never be confounded with feelings or perceptions, which 
alone are particular. 



188 ON thIi: euling principle of method. 

definite principles which, in my belief, do not make their 
appearance till the child has reached the third order of 
cognitions. 

In the first order we find only perceptions and imaginal 
ideas. Perceptions cannot be used as principles, on account 
of being always particular, and the same must be said of the 
remembrance of them. Imaginal ideas might be so used, 
since they are universal ; but as no more individuals exactly 
alike are to be found, they have no possible application. 
Moreover, they could be applied only on the repetition of 
past perceptions ; but the latter could not require them as 
their standard, the ideas being, in fact, the effect of the per- 
ceptions themselves. 

272. The second order of cognitions supplies abstract 
ideas, but goes no further than providing the mind with this 
supply and preparing the way for the third order of cogni- 
tions. And, in fact, the mind, when it applies to the judg- 
ment of things the ideas supplied through the second order 
of cognitions, performs precisely the operation by which it 
rises to the third order. 

Now, these principles are definite, because the abstract 
and semi-abstract ideas supplied by the second order of cog- 
nitions all have a limitation ; they do not embrace being in 
general, but limited being, circumscribed within more or less 
extended confines. The abstract idea of food, dog, etc., are 
not applied to all beings ; but serve only for the recognition 
of all such entities as are food, all such as are dogs, etc.-^ 
These ideas become, therefore, in their application, more 
restricted than the idea of being in general. 

1 The art of applying an idea is itself learned gradually by the child, and re- 
quires certain circumstances favorable to it. For the child to judge that a thing is 
food, it is not enough that he should have the idea of food, but he must have some 
experience of the thing seen, to enable him to recognize it as food. 



MORAL RULES. 189 

Section 2. — Morality, or Moral Rides. 

273. Let us pass on now from theoretical judgments to 
the practical moral principles which guide the child's actions. 

It is a mistake to suppose that the child has no rules of 
morality, — a mistake included in the common and most 
ancient prejudice, that the child has no use of reason, said 
reason appearing, according to the vulgar, quite suddenly, 
and as if by magic, at the age of seven years. 

The whole tendency of the present work is to destroy this 
unfortunate popular error. And, as regards the rules of 
morality, we have seen that the child gives signs of them as 
early as the second order of its cognitions. The earliest of 
all such rules may be reduced to two, which we have formu- 
lated thus : 1. " That which is beautiful, animated, and in- 
tellio-ent deserves admiration." 2. "That which is beautiful, 
animated, and intelligent deserves benevolence." Not that 
the child has yet any idea of merit ; but, his nature being 
intelligent and moral, he feels the consequent necessity of 
admiring and loving this beautiful, animated, intelligent 
thing, which he perceives by his sensations, and with which 
he is in vital communication. 

274. What modifications do these laws intrinsic to the 
child's moral nature undergo, when he reaches the third 
order of cognitions ? Do they cease to be ? Do they lose 
their force ? Are others added to them ? 

The moral nature of man can never lose its primary laws ; 
it will always feel the need to admire and to love that which 
is beautiful, animated, and intelligent, and only through 
violence or perversion will it cease to do so. But it is true 
that, besides these primary laws, others will arise in the 
human soul. Each age, each order of cognition, has its 
moral rules ; their aim, their essence, remain the same ; for 
all tend to prescribe esteem and love for what is beautiful, 



190 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

animated, and intelligent ; but they lead man to this common 
end by different ways ; they speak to him an ever new lan- 
guage, suited to the new condition of his mind : man believes 
that he is always gaining new moral maxims, when in fact it 
is alwa^'s the same immutable, eternal maxim taking new 
forms in his mind, manifesting itself anew. We must, then, 
follow these manifestations, these ever fresh expressions of 
moral duty, generated in the human mind with each new 
order of cognition ; and this is what we now purpose to do 
as regards the third of these orders. 

275. What, then, are the rules of morality for the child, 
when it has reached this third order ? 

Admiration and benevolence were already born in him in 
the second order. These impulses, which were effects of the 
primary laws of his nature, change, with his entrance into 
the third order, into moral rules which run as follows : 

That which is in conformity with what I admire is good. 

That which is in conformity with what I love is good. 

That which is contrary to both is bad. 

That which neither conforms nor is contrary to what I 
admire and love is indifferent. 

276. These moral rules of the fourth period of childhood 
differ widely from those earliest rules which govern the child 
in the preceding period. We have already seen that the per- 
sons under whose control he lives can largely influence the 
development and direction of his admiration and benevolent 
affections. By exercising this influence in their every w^ord 
and deed, they can narrow or widen the sphere of childish 
benevolence ; they can excite in the infant mind the feeling 
of malevolence ; inspire it with aversion for certain objects, 
and desire for certain others. We pointed out before how 
important it is to keep out of children's minds the percep- 
tion and thought of evil, that is, of the morally ugly, and to 
labor to fill them only with love and admiration, so that 



MORAL RULES. 191 

these affections may preserve the widest possible range. I 
believe that, in this ,way, an immense influence may be exer- 
cised towards insuring a moral and virtuous life in manhood, 
and towards preventing the growth of the passions by which 
manhood is most fiercely assaulted. But the happy influ- 
ence of this eaVliest moral education shows itself at once in 
the next intellectual period ; for on it depends whether the 
moral standards which the child forms for himself at that 
age shall be true or false, in harmony with, or opposed to, 
the nature of things, shall deceive him or lead him aright. 

It is evident that, if his moral standards are those w^e have 
named above, i. e., "That is good which is in conformity 
with what I admire or love," and, "That is bad which is 
opposed to what I admire and love," etc., the child's rules 
of action will be true or false, right or wrong, according as 
his admiration and love have been ill or well directed and 
cultivated. The character of the moral rule will clearly de- 
pend on the moulding of his mind through the preceding 
period. Hence we see the importance of making sure that 
the earliest impression on his soul, the earliest springs of 
esteem and affection laid there, should be wiiolly pure and 
natural, neither falsified nor altered by art, nor corrupted by 
ignorance or malice. For, if the moral rules which guide 
action are themselves falsified and warped by the first wrong 
impression made on his mind, how shall the child, with false 
standards, before his e^^es, guide himself aright? Even with 
the wish to go right, he would not have the power. Parents 
and teachers continually exclaim about the natural perversity 
of children ; but this perversity is not always a physical 
necessity, an innate evil. It seems so only because we do 
not see the secret workings continually going on in their 
little minds, by which their estimate of things has been 
thoroughly falsified : false principles have got into their 
little heads, which they obey faithfully before they can ex- 



192 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

press them, and the orighi of which no one could explain : 
no one, indeed, has actnally instilled them ; but their minds, 
whicli are never idle, and are always working out principles, 
following in this also their unalterable nature, go on con- 
structing and confirming for themselves certain profoundly 
false persuasions, which secretly govern their conduct, and 
are the cause of their every action, down to the most capi'i- 
cious and inexplicable. They are the only beacons of the 
child's soul, which, guiding itself by their deceptive light, 
inevitably goes astray. 

CHAPTER IV. 

DEVELOPMENT OF THE ACTIVE FACULTIES IN THE FOURTH 
PERIOD OF CHILDHOOD. 

ARTICLE I. 
IKCREASE OF SPONTANEOUS ACTrV'ITY. 

277. At the age which the child has now reached, we 
cannot yet speak of his actions as free^ but only as spon- 
taneous. In the Anthi'opology we have shown the wonderful 
laws which govern spontaneity, whether it be purely animal, 
or intellectual and moral. 

Among the spontaneous volitions must be classed the 
affective^ the estimative^ and the apjiredative. The affective 
and appreciative volitions already show themselves in the 
second period of childhood, through the first order of cogni- 
tions (132-13G). 

In the third period, tlie estimative volitions are manifested 
more explicitly through the second grade of cognitions 
(183, 184). 

The development of these two kinds of volition continues 
through the fourth period ; but the third kind, the appreci- 
ative, which requires the comparison of two or more objects, 
is still absent, and cannot be formed until the child has 



MORAL RULES. 193 

succeeded not only in counting two objects, which is done in 
the third order of cognitions, but also in comparing them 
together, and finding their differences, — a process which 
belongs, as we shall see, to the fourth order of cognitions. 

278. The increase of affective and estimative volitions 
which takes place in the child implies a constantly increasing 
spontaneitij^ a constantly growing amount of effective activ- 
ity. This spontaneous action, not being yet tempered and 
controlled by the free will wherewith the man governs him- 
self, displays in its manifestations its own nature and laws. 

I have shown that the following are the two principal laws 
of spontaneous action: (1) That it requires a stimulus to 
set it in motion. (2) That the activity produced is greater 
in proportion than the stimulus.^ 

This superabundance of action is due partly to the activ- 
ity of the mind itself, partly to the law of inertia, by which 
whatever has been set in motion continues to move till^ 
arrested by some other force. This law can be observed 
in the activity of children, and, as I am always in search of 
facts to lay before the reader, as the only trustworthy 
guarantees of what I affirm, I shall quote here the observa- 
tions of one who assuredly had no thought of supporting my 
opinions : — 

"The tendency of all the senses towards development, and to 
the overflow of life, as it were, from within outwards, produces in 
children a degree of external activity out of proportion to the 
inward motive impelling to it. Louisa certainly kisses me more 
than she loves me, as she cries more than she feels sorry, and 
laughs more than she feels glad ; ^ and in every case the expansive 

1 See Anthropology, Nos. 392-400, 419-425, 443-454. 

2 There is often another cause for this exaggeration in children. They not only 
want to relieve themselves, bnt to make those aromid them share their feelings, 
and so try to make the latter appear stronger than they really are. AVe have here 
one of those instances of refined cunning which prove but too well that the child- 
ish nature is not altogether truthful. But we shall spealv, further on, of the 
uutruthf uhiess of children. 



194 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

action, which is stronger than its cause, acts after the cause has 
ceased. Thus she goes on crying, though her pain is gone, and, 
when she has given vent to the craving for affection which brought 
her to me, she will go on pouring out her caresses on my chair or 
my table." ^ 

ARTICLE II. 

DESULTORINESS OF ACTION. 

279. Another characteristic of the child's activity is its* 
desultoriness, the absence of connections in his acts of 
volition, and, consequently, in the external actions which 
are their result.^ . 

If we admit the principle that all activity in man comes 
from a preceding passivity, and, in consequence, that all 
volitional activity follows on the conceptions of the intellect, 
we shall see that this absence of connection in his external 
movements and actions comes from the absence of connec- 
tion in the child's ideas. 

• In the second period of childhood, the conceptions which 
excite and direct the intellectual attention^ are the percep- 
tions, each of which is independent of every other. This 
want of connection in the child's actions does not, however, 
strike us so much at that age, because its activity is as yet 
feeble, and it attains its objects immediately. 

In the third period, the activity of the child busies itself 
with abstractions also. These primar}" abstractions have 
no connection with each other ; hence the corresponding ac- 

1 Mme. Guizot, Lettres de famille stir V education, L. I. 

2 See Anthropology, Nos. 623-627. 

3 It must be remembered that it is always of the activity of the will follow- 
ing intelligence that we speak. Contemporaneous with, and bound up in, this 
activity which belongs to the order of intelligence, there is also the animal activity. 
The latter has, mdeed, a certain unity of its own, arising from the unity of the ani- 
mal subject; but it is of slight importance, and escapes the observation of those 
who are seeking the more important unity which properly belongs to the rational 
subject. Moreover, the animal activity really diminishes with the birth and gTOwth 
of the intellectual activity, and more and more escapes observation, as the latter is 
more and more engrossed by the rational activity, which soon becomes dominant. 



DESULTOKINESS OF ACTION. 195 

tion is disconnected, and moves here and there, as from a 
thousand different centres. The greater the activity, the 
more disconnected it appears. At this age, action does not, 
as in the preceding one, attain its term, the real object it is 
seeking, immediately, but must pass through the intermedi- 
ate step, that, namely, of the abstract idea. 

In the fourth period, the child's active power goes on 
increasing in amount, and there is as yet nothing to make 
this evident, the principles of his action being infinite, i. e., 
as many as the ideas of which his acts are the application. 
As he proceeds in his development, these ideas will group 
themselves together, these principles of action will slowly 
become more general, and then the activity of the human 
being will of itself, and as if by magic, become an ordered 
activity, gathering itself together and drawing ever nearer to 
unity. Meanwhile, the adult is annoyed by this versatility 
of the child, which is incomprehensible to him, and he at- 
tempts to impose on the little creature the rules which most 
properly govern connected action, but are useless and inap- 
plicable to a being who has not one impulse, but many, each 
wholly disconnected with the other ; each by itself being 
unsusceptible of such rules, and each being unconscious of 
the others, so that they have no common existence. This is 
the cause of some of the greatest difficulties of the educator.^ 

Later on, we shall see how fancy enters into the activity 
of the child and increases its fickleness. 

ARTICLE III. 

PLAY. 

280. To this desultory activity of the child belongs its 
play, in which there is a great deal of action and a con- 

1 Mad. Gviizot shows how truly she has observed this when she notes the d\^- 
cnltj 'Ule saisir et de retenir ces fils delies et vn1ages,dont la reunion doit former 
unjour le tissu de la raison, I'enchainement de ses idees, V ensemble de sa conduite. 
L.I. 



196 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

staut succession of unconnected, but ever new, impressions. 
The impulse towards motion of every kind is explicable 
also by animal instincts. Motion is pleasant and healthy 
for the animal, whose movements are certainly not gov- 
erned by any rational principle, since none exists, but have 
each its reason and determination in the laws of animal 
nature. 

To movements of this kind, apparently without any rule 
or motive but pleasure, we give the name of play, and con- 
sider them under a burlesque aspect, which inclines us to 
laugh. The animal, however, has no more sense of fun in 
them than in the taking of food. All that belongs to 
laughter is foreign to its nature. But the capricious dis- 
order of such gestures and movements give us a sense of 
grotesque surprise which makes us laugh. The grotesque- 
ness lies in these movements as compared with ordinary 
movements governed by reason, and the surprise, in the 
unexpectedness of their continual novelty and singularity. 

281. The strange thing is that the child soon finds some- 
thing laughable in his own plaj' ; this becomes more and 
more apparent to him as his reason develops, and is a new 
source of enjoyment. He laughs at what he does himself 
and sees other children do ; yet it is not at himself that he 
is really laughing, for at himself he never laughs. It is the 
sign that he has become aware of the frivolity, the extrava- 
gance of his actions, and the educator should take advantage 
of this indication ; he should foster and perfect the child's 
self-acquired sense of the incongruity between his sports 
and his dignity as a rational being, and use this conscious- 
ness to lead him to quiet and orderly behavior. 

Hence, it is a mistake to applaud what is ridiculous in 
childish action. The natural movements may be allowed so 
long as they are produced by the animal nature, as it were, 
without the knowledge of reason ; but, when reason inter- 



MORAL ACTIVITY. 197 

venes and judges them as in a certain degree unwortliy, they 
should be gradually left off, and the child should learn to- 
feel ashamed of them. The educator should always add his 
influence to the child's own reason, to support and strengthen 
it. To this wild and unruly play should succeed the orderly 
exercises of gymnastics. 

The play, however, which consists in the constant destruc - 
tion of new things, is not found amongst animals ; it belongs 
to man alone, who finds in it the delight of satisfying his 
curiosity and his eagerness to perceive and know things 
under every possible aspect. I have already said that this 
kind of play may be of use in developing intelligence, if the 
teacher knows how to take advantage of it ; and it will 
become in his hands a real and delightful method of instruc- 
tion in mathematics.^ 

ARTICLE IV. 

MORAL ACTIVITY. 

282. At this age the moral activity of the child shows 
itself principally under two forms, the riglit of proj^ertij and 
obedience. Both are the effects of the child's benevolence 
and admiration. 

At the first stage of cognition, he neither possessed any- 
thing, nor obeyed ; but he admired and loved. He had per- 
ceived intelligent beings and beautiful objects of his affection 
and admiration, with which he communicated through sym- 
pathy and the instinct of imitation, but without any under- 
standing as yet of their thoughts or desires. Be it noted 
here that the sympathy and instinct of imitation, manifested 
in the animal order, belong also to that of intelligence. 
These laws, common to both the animal and intellective 

1 See Froebel's Kindcrgartpn Gifts and Games, as supplying exactly the or- 
dered and constructive play desired by Rosmiui for children at this age. — Trans' 
lator. 



198 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

principles, are so admirably interwoven that the one passes 
^ into the other without any perceptible interruption.^ 

283. Now, as soon as the child values and likes a thing, 
he conceives at once the sense of property ; in other words, 
the thing becomes, as it were, spiritually united to him, and 
he resents its being taken from him, as if it w^ere the loss of 
a part of himself.^ The things belonging to those he loves 
are perceived by him together with them, and, therefore, he 
cannot bear to see them taken away ; it is like taking away 
a part of the persons themselves (238). This feeling 
springs, in the first instance, from the animal unitive force 
(and similar phenomena may be noticed in animals) ; thus 
the will (the affective volitions) comes to the assistance of 
the natural animal desires ; next, the understanding also 
perceives the advantage of contemplating lovely things, and 
is pained if they are withdrawn from its contemplation ; 
finally (and certainly very much later), the understanding 
arrives at a knowledge of the uses of the things, and values 
them for these also, after which the will clings to them with 
a new and less noble love than before, — the love of self- 
interest. Out of these elements the material part of the 
right of property is gradually built up : its formal part can 
be given to it only by the sense of duty, the moral law. 

1 The instinct of imitation is communicated to the nnclerstancling even before 
the latter iierceives through tlie affective volitions tlie things to be imitated. The 
animal instinct impels the whole sensitive and willing subject towards its object, 
because the subject wills that to which the animal instinct impels it, without know- 
ing really what it is that it wills ; it wants to make the animal operations easier, 
without kmowing that, in doing so, it is imitating. The intellective sympathy acts 
more directly ; the intelligent being inclines to take the form which it sees, or 
believes it sees, in another intelligent being, of which it has the perception. This 
agaifi is, at first, aided by the instinct of imitation. 

2 The following facts show how the child perceives things associated together 
as one thing. — "No image stands alone in his mind," says an observer ; " he does 
not separate the surroundings, the accessories, from tlie principal subject ; they 
form part of his idea of it. I have seen a child nine months old cry bitterly and 
refuse its food because the cup, saucer, and spoon were not placed exactly as 
usual. It becomes a natural necessity to them (the children) to see everything in 
its place," etc. — Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. III. c. i. 



PROPERTY AND OBEDIENCE. .109 

If in the first stage of cognition, the child perceives 
beauty in things, in the second, when they are taken from 
him he has the painful feeling of deprivation ; in the third, 
he abstracts their action from the things themselves, and 
begins to value them for their uses, or at least is preparing 
himself to do so. 

284. From the same source of admiration and benevo- 
lence springs, as I have said, the child's obedience. 

In him obedience is only the wish and the will to conform 
himself to the intelligent beings which have become the 
objects of his affections. From the beginning, he strives 
after this conformity, through sympathy and intellective 
animal imitation. But, when he has reached the second 
order of cognitions, he acquires, in learning to speak, a new 
means of communication between his mind and the minds of 
those dear and precious to him. A new light dawns upon 
him ; he can look into their minds, and there discover 
thoughts and will ; with these he finds new ways by which 
he can unite and suit himself to them. These discoveries 
he makes by means of language, which he begins to learn 
in the second stage of cognitions, and goes on with through 
the following ones. 

The key which language furnishes him in the third order 
of cognitions enables him to read the opinions and wishes 
of his fellow-beings. From his perception of these soon 
follow in the child belief and obedience. 

Belief is in him only the wish, the tendency, to think the 
same as the persons he lives with. 

Obedience, at first, is also a similar wish and tendency to 
be of the same mind with those around him. 

In this their primitive form, the belief and obedience of 
the child arise, then, from his craving to be at one with those 
who are known to him. 

285. This craving for uniformity felt bv human souls, as 



200 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

soon as they come to a knowledge of each other, is a pro- 
found and mysterious thing ; to exphiin it satisfactorily, we 
should have to enter into the religious secret of ontological 
doctrine. This would be impossible here. We must content 
ourselves with clearly setting forth the facts. 

The first of these facts is, that the child shows signs of 
respect and affection to whatever person first smiles at him. 
At that time he is simply just ; there is no acceptance of 
persons with him ; he is a judge who, since the names of 
those who would cajole him are to him unknown, judges 
impartially secundum allegata et probata: his tendency to 
respect and benevolence is universal. In the intelligent 
being, then, rooted in the depths of his nature, there is this 
primary necessity of growing respect and love to whatsoever 
intelligent being he comes to know. Here is the great fact 
on which, as upon a rock, is founded the whole of morality. 
I must refer the reader to the theory I have given of it 
elsewhere.^ 

As the affection which the child gives to the persons he 
knows springs from this primary necessity, so again from 
this affection springs his need to be perfectly at one with 
them. It is often said that love either finds or makes a 
likeness between the persons loved. It may be added with 
equal truth, that love makes a likeness between him who 
loves and him who is loved ; and the reason is plain : love 
requires union, — a union so close that it tends to become 
an actual fusion of two into one. Such a union, however, 
such an intermingling of two beings, can take place only 
through conformity of thought, by which two minds unite 
in one judgment, and conformity of desires, by which two 
hearts are united in one aspiration, — have the same good, 
the same evil, rejoice together in the first, suffer together 

* Philosophy of Morals, Works. 



RESPECT AND LOVE. 201 

from the last, move as one toward the good, draw away as 
one from the evil. I repeat that here lie mysteries into 
which I will not enter here. I only state that such is the 
fact. And, in witness of it, I appeal to all ; for there lives 
no human creature that does not love. 

286. If, instead of the direct expression of this fact, we 
wish to give it a scientific form, we may put it as follows : 

When one being having intelligence and will meets an- 
other, the natural effects manifested by him are respect 
and affection. 

That is the first part of the fact ; the second is this : 

When an intelligent being has perceived another, and, 
yielding to the law of his nature, has opened his heart to 
the feelings of respect and love, these feelings impose a 
moral necessity to conform his own beliefs to the beliefs ^ of 
that other, and his will to the other's will, as soon as he 
learns what they are.^ 

The idea of deception can come to the child only from 
experience, as only from experience can he get the idea that 
harm will come to him from conforming to the will of others. 
The very conception of good and evil enters later into the 
child's mind. He has only the two tendencies, to belief and 
obedience^ pure and simple, neither disturbed nor restrained 
by suspicion, and therefore in their greatest strength. This 
is the primitive foundation of the facility with which the 
child believes and obeys. They are the natural tendencies 
of an intelligent being, to which the child yields because 
nothing opposes his spontaneous impulse. 

1 By the word beliefs I mean the opinions, convictions, judgments, which are 
not only present to the mind, but to which it has given assent. 

- Hence is derived a very general principle, i. e., that every intelligence 
should be believed in and obeyed. This is the rule; the contrary is the exception. 
If an intelligence deceives or is deceived ; if its desires are stupid or perverse, that 
is only the effect of its accidental corruption. With this recondite principle may 
be coimected the fine sentence of St. Francis de Sales, who used to say that the 
virtue of obedience could be exercised towards all men, even towards iivferiors. 



202 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

CHAPTER V. 

THE INSTRUCTION CORRESPONDING TO THE COGNITIONS OF 
THE THIRD ORDER. 

ARTICLE I. 

WHAT IS MEANT MORE FULLY BY INSTRUCTION CORRESPONDING TO A 
CERTAIN ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 

287. We come now to the instruction and moral educa- 
tion corresponding to the order of cognitions previously 
treated of. Although the reader knows generally what we 
mean by such instruction, I will put it into more definite 
terms, to avoid any misunderstanding or objection to the 
method I have laid down. 

The instruction, then, corresponding to a given order of 
cognitions has three perfectly distinct parts: 

(1) The instruction which serves to increase in the mind 
of the pupil the number of cognitions he has gained in the 
preceding order and to make them more perfect. 

(2) The instruction which enables the pupil to pass from 
the order of cognition in which he finds himself to the next 
higher one. 

(3) The instruction which serves to exercise and perfect 
the pupil in the knowledge belonging to the order he has 

reached. 

The important distinction between these three parts suf- 
fices to dispel any fear that our method will retard the pro- 
oress of the human mind. On the contrary, it points out 
the most direct, the quickest, and the pleasantest way the 
mind can take in its natural progress. 

ARTICLE 11. 

THE LANGUAGE AND STYLE TO BE USED BY THE TEACHER. 

288. It is evident that the language and style of the 
teacher should vary according to the order of cognition 



LANGUAGE. 203 

attained by the child. As language and its component 
parts involve a somewhat extensive range of cognitions, it 
follows that not every word of a language can ])e brought 
into use in speaking to a little child. Such words as can- 
not be classed under one or other of the three parts of 
instruction pointed out above, as suitable to his degree of 
development, i. e., those belonging to an anterior order of 
cognitions, those of the following order which his mind can 
reach at its next step, or those in that order which it has 
already reached, are simply wasted ; and, being unintelligible 
to him, they only tend to confuse and disturb the progress 
of his ideas, like stones thrown across his path, and make it 
more difficult for him to understand even such words as 
are within the reach of his intelligence. 

289. We have seen that the child, on arriving at the 
second order of cognitions, can understand nouns, ^ and, at 
the third, verbs, ])ut neither the declensions of the former 
nor the conjugations of the latter, which involve too much 
reflection on the relations of things. What he understands 
is the noun in its simplest form, and the verb in the infinitive 
mode, together with the participial forms in which the verb 
is still a noun, but one expressing action. At this stage, 
then, only such words and such forms must be used as pre- 
suppose no more than the next order of cognitions, to which 
the child's mind should now pass on, and which, in the pres- 
ent case, is the fourth. In talking to children, we must con- 
fine ourselves, as much as possible, to these words and forms, 
and through them we shall find and keep open the means 
of communication between our adult minds and theirs. 

We may say the same of the manner of speaking and 
of the thoughts expressed to them. Neither should require 
cognitions beyond those of the fourth order, at most, and 

1 Interjections are not i:)roperly words, but effects of animal sensations, felt 
alike by the animal and the new-born infant. 



204 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

those which cau be connected with such cognitions of the 
preceding order as akeady exist in the child's mind. 

ARTICLE III. 

MATTER OF INSTRUCTION. 

Section 1.— Action. 

290. The child at every age must act. His activity is, 
as we have seen, of three kinds : corporal, intellectual, and 
moral. He requires all three as means of development ; 
but they should be properly directed. 

As to the quantity of action, the activity natural to the 
child should be neither repressed nor excited, but only 
moderated, when its excess might endanger health. 

As to quality, only such activity should be encouraged 
as is proportioned to the degree of knowledge attained. 
The difficulty is to ascertain exactly what that is. 

As to regularity., two rules should be observed : 

(1) The order between the different kinds of activity, 
which subordinates and makes the corporal activity sub- 
servient to the intellectual, and both to the moral. 

(2) The order within each kind, securing in each uniform- 
ity, steadiness, and regularity, — in short, the utmost rea- 
sonableness possible. 

To teach and guide the child in these things is really to 
educate him. 

Section 2. — Oral Exercises. 

291. Although the child might, so soon as he can speak 
a little, be taught to read, I think it preferable to keep 
him still in the preparatory school of oral exercises. 

These exercises consist of two parts, the intellectual and 
the mechanical. Both should be combined in the exercises 
prescribed to the child. 

I have already recommended (188 and foil.) that from 



MATTER OF INSTRUCTION. 205 

the second stage of cognition tlie child be made to name 
as many things as possible.-^ 

This exercise belongs to the inteUectual division^ and 
shonld be continued, not only now, but through many fol- 
lowing stages of knowledge. Hitherto, the child has gone 
no further than nouns; but he should now be exercised in 
verbs ^ and in the other parts of speech, observing the 
same rules as before. 

The mechanical exercise should now be joined to the 
intellectual and alternated with it. This exercise consists 
in correcting the pronunciation of children, and teaching 
them the perfect use of their organs of speech. 

292. In fact, the first thing to be done, as soon as chil- 
dren begin to speak a little, is to teach them to bring out 

1 Every thought of the child is complex, and he has not yet analyzed it. Hence, 
the first thing the child understands is the whole of what is said to him, i. e., the 
meaning of the whole sentence, not of the single words. This fact has been 
already noted. Some observations lead me to think that he (the child) does not 
separate them {the conjunctions and 2)ai-ticles of the sentence) from the sentence 
of which they form a part. That sentence to him is one long word, the meaning 
of which he guesses through his wonderful sympathy, — a long word which he 
repeats distinctly, if his ear is true and his vocal organ docile, or which he mangles 
and shortens if they be not, but which he does not decompose. Even when he 
meets with the same words in different sentences he does not immediately recog- 
nize them. They remain to huu what syllables are to us, which we meet with 
everjTvhere without attaching any meaning to them. Perhaps it is only reading 
that teaches us the real divisions of words. This is the reason why we find that the 
common people, who write without having read much, bind their words together, 
in the oddest fashion, and connect or disconnect them at random. (Mad. jVecker 
de Saussure, L. II. c. ii.) Hence^ by making the child listen to the separate words, 
we lead him to know the parts of speech. In this sense it is true that languages, as 
defined by Condillac, are so many analytical methods. Observe, in this action of 
the constructive intelligence of the child, a new phenomenon of the imitative 
force, be it animal or intellectual. 

2 The Abbate Aporti, in his Manual, places the verbs expressing the movements 
and sounds made by animals after their names, and thus makes verbs and nouns 
alternate closely on each other. I should place noims and verbs as separate 
degrees of instruction, corresponding to separate ages or orders of cogidtion. At 
the third order, I should make the child repeat the names of the things learnt, 
and after these the adjectives, and then the verbs signifying the actions of those 
things. Here I would end the second table. In the third, I would go a step 
further, and so on. 



206 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

the sounds correctly. At first, their utterance is very de- 
fective ; they stammer, lisp', cut off syllables, strangle the 
sounds, etc. ; and, before they are allowed to read or write, 
they should be made to pronounce correctly, and to over- 
come even the most difficult syllables. 

Some excellent promoters of infant schools in Italy have 
already turned their attention to this matter, and have laid 
it down that children should be made to pronounce " clearly 
and correctly all the elementary sounds of which the entire 
words are composed." ^ 

I believe we might commence this exercise with advantage 
by making the child sound the musical tones ^ taking first the 
natural scale and then the intervals, which, if his ear has 
been accustomed to them during the earlier period of 
infancy, will be already familiar means. ^ 

This exercise should be followed by, or alternated with, 
the pronunciation of the votijel sounds articulated in speech. 

The order in which the child should be made to pronounce 
the elementary sounds should be the same, I think, as that 
in which he will afterwards learn to read and write them ; 
beginning, that is, with the vowels, then going on to the 
compounds of vowels, next to syllables composed of each 
vowel with every other letter of the alphabet, then to syl- 
lables of three letters, and so on.^ 

293. When the child has learnt to pronounce with perfect 
correctness all the letters, syllables, and words, he may pass 

1 See // Manuale di educazione ed ammaestramento per le scuole infantUi. 
Cremona, 1833. Parte II. c. i. 

2 Tunes, if perfectly simple, are easier for the infant than single notes, and 
should, therefore, come first, but be soon followed by the single notes, which are 
their elements. This would be an analysis required of the sense of hearing. 

3 I must bring to the reader's notice in this place a singular coincidence of 
thought between Antonio Rosmini, Rafael Lambruschini, and Viucenzo Troia. 
The first laid down in 1839, as seen above, the logical principle on which pronun- 
ciation, and later on, reading, should be taught to children, while contempora- 
neously, the second at Florence, the third at Turin, were seeking the natural method 
of teaching both, and came to entire agreement with Rosmini, as may be seen 



LEARNfNG TO PRONOUNCE AND WRITE. 207 

on to the intellectual part of the oral exercise. To this 
belong instruction in naming objects, as we pointed out 
before, and also the analysis of sounds. Aporti, in hi^ 
Manual^ gives a good example of this (Part II. art. v.),. 
except that it seems to me too soon to speak to the chilu 
of diphthongs or triphthongs, and better to mention only 
plurality of sounds. It is simply impossible that he should 
understand what is meant by diphthongs and triphthongs, 
while the idea of two or three sounds is perfectly easy 
to him.^ 

Thus it seems to me impossible to make him understand 
that ia in ahhia is a diphthong, but is not one in uhhi-a; 
and Aporti's solitary example from ai does not prove it to 
be a diphthong rather than two single sounds ; for it may be 
pronounced ai^ ai, in which cases it is a diphthong, or «-z, 
separating the syllables, when it is no longer a diphthong, 
but simply a double sound. 

in the admirable spelling-book which they gave to Italy, both instances affording 
a proof that the earnest and patient seekers after truth will find her meeting 
them always and everywhere the same. — Fr. Paoli. 

1 A diphthong consists of two vowels pronounced at once. The addition made 
by Lambruschini to this definition, inz., "that the accent should be on one of the 
two, this more sustained and accentuated vowel drawing into itself and domi- 
nating the other, so as to become, as it were, the true vowel, whilst the other, 
absorbed and overcome, plays the part of a consonant" {Gukia dell' Educatorc, 
iios. 31-32, fac. 218), seems to me not essential to the diphthong, although, probably, 
always true for Italian. In fact, in almost all other languages, except Italia !i, 
there are diphthongs in which the two vowels are so mingled and mterpenetrated 
as to form a third somid, precisely because each one has lost its own. Greek 
scholars observe that in Greek tliere are three species of diphthong ; in some the 
first vowel is long and the second shortened, as in a, 37, rjv, o), wv; in others the 
vowels are both short, or the first is long, according to the derivation, as in 
au, VL. Finally, there are others in which both vowels are short, as in ai, et, ev, 
01, ov, and their mingled sounds are blended, as it were, in a third. According 
to the grammarians, the latter alone are proper diphthongs ; the others they term 
improper. I will not say that the vowel which is shortened in the improper 
diphthongs plays the part of a consonant; but it is pronounced with a slighter 
movement of the lips, and uttered more rapidly in opening or closing them. Thus 
in ama the final a, which is the more slightly pronounced, escapes through the 
closing of the lips, while in ahh'ia the vowel i, which is the shorter, escapes 
through openmg them. 



208 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Moreover, if we are to base education on a strictly logical 
method, I think that we cannot speak of consonants as 
having a sound apart from vowels. They are but the be- 
ginnings or endings of sound, ^ which beginnings and end- 
ings cannot exist without the sound, any more than a point 
without a line, or a line without a superficies, or a superficies 
without a solid. This being premised, I cannot think it 
right that the teacher, when he has pronounced the syllable 
6^, and asks the child how many sounds he has heard, should 
make him answer, as in the Manual of Aporti, two. He 
ought, rather, to answer one, as he certainly would do of 

1 The vowel is formed by the voice coming out of the open nioutli (by open 
mouth I mean the separation of the upper and under lip,, so tliat the air, modified 
into sound, may freely pass through). But, if the voice is thrown out in the act 
of opening the mouth, that is, before it is quite open, and is sustained through the 
act of closing it, it finds an impediment either at the beginning or the end, and the 
modification it thus receives is called a consonant. Let the experiment be tried 
with the syllable ha or ab, and it will appear at once that the 6 is only the be- 
gimiing or the end of the sound a, which finds an obstacle either m issuing from 
the lips, or in continuing as they close. What is true of the action of the lips in 
the labials (6, p, m, v, f) may be applied equally to the tongue and teeth in the 
dentals {d, I, n, t), to the tongue and palate in the palatals (c, g, j, s, z), to the 
tongue and throat in the gutturals {ch, gJi, li, k, g). We must, however, distinguish 
from the consonants the nasal intonation and the aspirates, which are slight 
sounds, not distinctly vocalized, but supplementing the vowels in facilitating the 
pronunciation of the consonants. AVhenever several consonants are joined in a 
syllable, as, when the first consonant is an s, or when the second is a ]} or an I, 
there is always an aspirate or a nasal intonation to enable them to be pronounced. 
For example, in sci,* sdo, sfa, sgo, etc., and in all others where s is the first conso- 
nant, we have the sibilant aspirate, which is necessary for the pronunciation of 
these united consonants. If m enters into the syllable, as in svio, etc., besides the 
sibilant, we have a certain degree of nasal sound before the m. In the syllables 
pra, era, etc., there is a harsh aspirate before the r, which makes the sound tremu- 
lous. In cla, 2)li, there is a soft aspirate before the /, which makes the sound flow 
more gently. The double consonants, on the other hand, are not given by aspirates 
or nasal intonation, but simply l)y a slight pause interposed between them. These 
are the only instances in the Italian language of the accumulation of consonants. 
Tlie word mnemonica, and some others of foreign origin, are pronounced with the 
nasal mtonation preceding the letter m. An exception must be made for words 
where the r is followed by an /, as in Carlo, and in which the two consonants never 
form one syllable, althougli the I is the second continuous consonant. 

* It must be remembered that all these examples are based on Italian pronunciation, and the 
reader should supply parallel ones from L'nglisli sjilables. — Translator. 



VOCAL SOUNDS. 209 

himself, since that syllable is only a single sound. He 
should, indeed, when he has' given that answer, be made to 
pronounce first ^, and then M, and be asked if those are the 
same sound. He will, of course, answer that hi is a different 
sound from i, and must then be asked where the difference 
lies, at the beginning or at the end of the sound. Answer^ 
At the beginning. And the sound ih^ is that the same as i 
or hi? No, it is different. But where is it different from i? 
At the beo-innino; or the end? At the end. And from hi? 



n n i I ^ „ 

At the beo-innino-. And this exercise should be continued 



&"^"'^"&' 



through all the syllables. Tlie child should be exercised in 
the decomposition of words into their sounds, i. e., their 
syllables, and in recognizitig and noting their differences.^ 
This oral exercise will be a most useful preparation for read- 
ing, which will be taught next, and it will greatly assist the 
child in intellectual study. ^ 

294. It is well also at this age to make him number like 
things, so that, in rising through the numerical scale, he may 
be led on to rise through the various orders of cognition. 
This implies a more rapid advance than would seem due 
from the fact we have previously observed, that each num- 
ber belongs to a different order of cognition. But the reason 

1 The noting of differences belongs to the next order of reflections; but this 
exercise will help the child admirably to rise in the hitellectual scale, as also will 
arithmetical exercises. 

2 Li teaching to read, the gradual steps must be as follows: 

1. Show how the vowels are written. 

2. Show how two, three, or more vowels joined together are written. 

3. Go on to the syllables having one consonant only, such as ba, he, hi, ho, hu, 
making the child observe how these five sounds are each modified at the beginning 
by the same check to the voice, and then making him understand that this modifi- 
cation may be indicated by a sign placed before each. Let the sign, for example, 
be a stop, .a, .e, .i, .o, .u : make him pronounce ba, he, hi, bo, hu, and then es- 
tablish that h is the figure by which that modification is signified. 

The same must be done witli the syllables ab, eh, ih, oh, ub; bab, beb, bib, bob, 
huh, and so on with every consonalnt, letter by letter. When we come to the 
joining of several consonants, the child nutst learn the use of the aspirates and 
the nasal tone. But more will be said in its proper place on the subject of reading. 



210 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

of this rapidity is found in the extremely simple formula by 
which he quickly learns to pass from one number to another. 
This formula consists in always adding a unit to the things 
akeady numbered. He repeats the same operation, signify- 
ing it by a new number. When he says one and one is 
two, two and one is three, three and one is four, and so 
on, he has not at all the distinct cognition of two, three, etc., 
which he names and distinguishes by this repeated operation ; 
but, without attending to the sum accumulated, he adds to it 
a unit and gives it another name. Even so, this is a useful 
exercise for the child, and we may, at first, give him for the 
purpose two similar objects, balls or the like, then three, 
then four, etc., letting him play with them till he has got 
together the number we want him to learn. Other exercises 
of the kind are mentioned in the Manual for Infant Schools ^ 
(Part II. art. V.) 

Section 3. — Teaching by Pictures. 

295. The child may also be taught at this age by pictures, 
which he is fond of and takes orreat delioht in.^ Amono-st 
other advantages to be derived from their use might be 
that of preparing him for the reading and writing lessons, 
soon to follow. The earliest mode of writing seems to have 
been pictorial ; this was afterwards shortened into hiero- 
glyphics ; writing by letters was probably invented latest 
of all. 

It has already been suggested that the same process 
should be applied to children ; but the difficulty is to find 
pictorial images which would admit of being converted into 
the letters of the alphabet. The difficulty is greater still, 

1 Note of Translator. I need not point out to the reader that this method of 
teaching arithmetic is practically the same as FroebePs, and is that adopted in the 
ordinary infant schools in England and elsewhere. 

2 Mad. Necker de Saussnre mentions a child of 11 months old, who could recog- 
nize a dog in an engraving, and at a year old could be amused by looking at 
pictures. — L. III. c. v. 



MORAL EDUCATION. 211 

if we insist that the name of the thing pictured should con- 
tain in its first syUable the letter itself, which yet is an 
immense help to children in learning to read. I have, how- 
ever, contrived such an alphabet for the use of the schools 
of the Brethren of Charity, and the Sisters of Providence, 
to which I must refer the reader.^ 

CHAPTER VI. 

THE MORAL EDUCATION CORRESPONDING TO THE THIRD PERIOD. 

ARTICLE I. 

OF THE OBJECTIVE PRINCIPLE AND THE SUBJECTIVE PRINCIPLE ON WHICH 
THE CHILD ACTS AT THIS PERIOD. 

296. The morality of children has been very differently 
estimated. People, in general, believe they have none. 
Certain sagacious observers discover that there is a morality 
in childhood, but are divided in their judgment of it, some 
asserting that it is good, and wholly good ; others that it 
is bad, and wholly bad. 

The reason why most people find no morality in children 

^ The Art of Teaching to Read. Such is the title of a little book the author 
intended to publish, but of which he scarcely completed the spelling-tables al- 
luded to in the note I appended to No. 292. In other portions of the present work, 
he proposes the compilation of similar primers for elementary education, and 
in conversation he frequently mentioned the same wish. Amongst liis papers 
I found a note of the following subjects : 

\. A vocabulary showing the proper use of words. 

2. A book of moral sentences suited to various ages. 

3. A book of poetry for various ages. 

4. A picture book. 

5. A selection of dramatic representations. 

6. A selection of musical pieces suited to infant intelligence and set to 
childish words. 

7. A selection of words, phrases, construction of sentences, divided according 
to the child's grade of knowledge. 

8. Method of reading and writing. 

9. Method of graduated arithmetic. 

10. A book teaching how to develop the idea of God in the child's mind, and 
to bring back to it all other ideas throughout the various stages of childhood, ^ 
Fk. Paoh. 



212 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

is because they look for the morality of adults. We have 
said enough previously to demonstrate that the child has a 
morality of his own. That, nevertheless, he occasionally 
shows vestiges of a principle of error and moral disorder, 
is a fact recognized by the most of those who have investi- 
gated human nature, unbiassed by preconceived S3^stems ; 
and is, moreover, one of the most profound and marvellous 
dogmas of Christianity. 

We reserve a few more words on this subject till we come 
to the time when the child begins to act from choice ; up to 
that time he simply obeys the spontaneous impulse arising 
from the various degrees of his benevolence, which are 
determined solely by external reasons.-^ 

We shall, therefore, confine ourselves at present to observ- 
ing the child's morality as it is in itself, without any regard 
to what it may contain of original evil. 

Lovers of children, who have observed them attentivel}', 
think they have perceived that their morality is very incon- 
stant, and shows no fixed principle. Here is the judgment 
of a mother, who yet would have wished to say everything 
that was good of creatures so dear as these little children : 

" Nothing, certainly, can be more irregular and fickle than a 
child's moral feeling at three years of age. In fact, the predomi- 

1 I conjecture that there exists from the first, in the depths of the child's soul, 
a hidden mine, as it were, of benevolence and of malevolence more or less con- 
siderable. This portion of benevolence, concreated in men, to which, perhaps. Job 
alluded when he said that compassion was born with him {quia ah infantia men 
crevit mecum miseratio: et de utero matris mese egressa est mecum, xxxi. 18),* is that 
which marks and inspires their conduct when occasions arise, and makes one 
man genial, another narrow and cold-hearted. But even geniality and benevo- 
lence are of different kinds, and are originated more or less by corporeal sensations. 
There is a highest kind which comes from the light of truth. It seems to me per- 
fectly credible that, among the original varieties of mankind, there should be one 
khid of a deeper and nobler nature, consisting in the greater power of intuition 
of mental Ijeing. "Whosoever has the largest, clearest intuition of this, has a 
greater treasiu-e of the noblesx. love in his heart, which, to my thudving, is the 
happiest disposition towards virtue. 

* This is the Vulgate version : that of the Euglish Bible is quite different.— Translator's note. 



CHILD MOKALITY. 213 

nating elements in the child's mind rarely allow of his forming 
a judgment in cold blood. Always carried away by the influence 
of some emotion, prejudiced by himself or by those whom he 
loves, he is at one moment utterly selfish, and then suddenly 
seems to throw his whole personality into that of another, with- 
out, however, being more just when thus self-devoted." ^ 

297. In fact, certain acts of the child at this age would 
seem to prove his extreme selfishness, and others his 
extreme disinterestedness. Whence this apparent contra- 
diction ? 

To find the answer, we must penetrate into a mystery 
of the infant mind, which I know not if any one has 3^et 
fathomed. The way by which I would lead the reader into 
it is as follows : 

The child feels his seJf^ but has no iclea^ no knowledge 
of it ; he cannot have the intellectual perception of himself 
till he has attained a higher grade of cognition. I will give 
the proof of this in the next section, and, in the mean wdiile, 
must beg the reader to accept it as a postulate.^ 

Now, during the whole time previous to the child's becom- 
ing capable of the intellectual perception of himself, he 
is unable, voluntarily^ to refer good or evil to his known 
SELF, because this known self does not yet exist for him. 
This is the reason of his completely disinterested actions. 
His action is as yet entirely objective ; the subjective does 
not 3^et exist for his intellect and his will. 

298. But, then, why do so many of his other actions 
appear so full of selfishness? 

In the first place, simultaneously with the intellectual 

1 Mad. Necker de Saiissure, L. III., c. vi. 

2 I am aware that this will appear to many a paradox of the first magnitude. 
But, for the very reason that it has this appearance at first sight, the sagacious 
and kindly reader will doubt the reality of the appearance, giving me credit for 
not departing from what has the greatest semblance of truth, except for the 
gravest reasons and after the most careful examination, 



214 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

activity, but on a lower plane, there is the animal activity 
at work in the child, and the latter has all the appearance 
of egoism, though the term ^ cannot properly be applied to 
it. For, being derived from ego^ it signifies the self-love 
of a subject knowing itself ; the ego (I) being precisely the 
self -knowing subject.^ 

In the second place, although the child does not perceive 
himself, he yet feels and perceives mentally both pain and 
pleasure ; but, knowing no subject to which he can refer 
these, he attributes them to the objects which occasion them, 
and associates them so closely with the perception and 
image of the latter, that to him they become one and the 
same thing. What he icills^ then, are the objects ; his 
action is always objective ; but these objects are composed 
for him of pleasures and pains, as constituent elements, 
which would, in fact, be his own, if he only knew it. We 
must, therefore, distinguish the pleasures and pains per- 
ceived in themselves, apart from the subject, and imagined 
to ])e in the object, from the pleasures and pains referred 
to the subject. Action, in so far as it is moral, takes its 
character from the conception and intention of the agent. 
Therefore, when the child conceives the pleasures and pains 
he feels to be in the objects perceived, he acts in intention 
on an objective principle ; but the appearance of his action 
is wholly subjective^ because he is, in fact, always seeking 
the objects which give him pleasure and avoiding those 
which give him pain. It is we who attribute this subjective 
character to the' child's action ; for it is we who refer it 
to the child subject, which the child himself does not. We 
treat the child's actions as we do our own, and we refer 
the latter to ourselves, because we have had and always 

1 In my History of Moral Systems I have shown that to none of the blind 
impulses can the term interested or disinterested be applied. — Cap. IV., art. iv. 
Philosophy of Morals, v. i. 

3 See the definition and analysis of the Eyo in the Anthropology, nos. 805-811. 



DISCIPLINE AT THIS STAGE. 215 

continue to have the perception of ourselves. Hence, by 
analogy, we apply to the child's conduct the motives which 
guide the adult, and this is the common error, the source 
of the endless contradictions which we seem to discover 
in the actions of children. 

ARTICLE II. 

ON RESISTANCE, CONSIDERED IN RELATION TO THE CHILD IN THE 

FOURTH PERIOD. 

299. What has been already said with reference to the 
amount and kind of resistance which should be offered to 
the child in the previous period (227 and foil.) must be 
applied in the present and the following periods. 

The objects which we ^should aim at, and which should 
regulate our resistance to the child, and the degree of 
severity we exercise towards him, are : To obtain from him 
a moderate exercise of patience ; to rectify his conceptions ; 
to do away with malevolent feelings ; to remove limits from 
his benevolent ones. 

As he grows older, he can bear a more rigid discipline. 
The principle being once laid down, that, in our treatment 
of him, we must apply his moral principles, and not our own, 
which he cannot understand, it follows that, with the growth 
of his principles, we gain more and more means of influ- 
ence over him, and may justly exact more from him than 
at first. 

I say that we may exact more from him than at firsts 
because all we can expect from him is, that he should con- 
form to his own principles, and we can demand from him 
only his own morality, not ours ; it is only when he departs 
from that, that we have the right and the duty to recall him 
to it, and to attach pain to all those actions which are con- 
trary to the morality he recognizes, in order that his instinc- 
tive fear of pain may help him to avoid those actions which 
seduce him by their apparent pleasantness. 



216 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

This increase of resistance is the more necessary that the 
child develops, as he grows older, various feelings of ill-will 
and restiveness, which a wise vigilance should discern and 
quench the moment they appear, lest they should take root 
and spread. 

ARTICLE m. 

DIVINE WORSHIP. 

300. The same form of worship should be carried on at 
this age as was indicated in the preceding sections (245- 
248). But when God has been named to the child, and 
he has been taught to know Him, as the most loveable 
of beings, the highest good, it will be time to make Him 
known as God-Man,^ and Mary as his mother, and to call 
upon their names, as often as possible, for help in every 
need, for strength in every action, for thanksgiving in every 
joy. It is incredible how this exercise will tend to perfect 
the idea of God in the child's mind, to awaken religious 
feelings in his heart, and to strengthen him in all virtuous 
dispositions and habits. 

Finally, we must not neglect to obtain for him those 
graces of which we have spoken at the period of infancy. 

1 Note of Translator. — The reader is requested here to bear in mind the 
Translator's protest as regards religious dogmas and practices, in the note to 
No. 137. 



SECTION V. 

THE COGNITIONS OF THE FOURTH ORDER AND THE 
CORRESPONDING EDUCATION. 

CHAPTER I. 

COGNITIONS OF THE FOURTH ORDER. 

ARTICLE I. 

CLASSIFICATION OF THE COGNITIONS OF THE FOURTH ORDER. 

301. All the processes peculiar to the preceding stages 
of development are continued in this, repeating themselves, 
becoming more complex, producing new concepts in the 
understanding and new affections of the will. It is enough 
to draw attention to this fact, which holds good for each 
of the succeeding stages, the human mind throughout life 
carrying on, from one stage of development to the other, 
all that it had gained in the previous stages. 

Passing onwards,* then, without further comment, to the 
cognitions of the fourth order, let us inquire what they 
are. 

It would take us too long to make a complete classifica- 
tion of them. We have shown the method which should 
be followed where we gave the classification of the cog- 
nitions of the third order (nos. 253-255). It will suffice for 
our purpose to show that all the cognitions of the fourth 
order may be reduced to two large classes. 

Class I. —Those that have for their object the relations 
between the cognitions of the third order. 

Class II. —Those that have for their object the reIatio7is 
between the cognitions of the third and those of the pre- 
ceding orders. 



217 



218 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

It is evident from whut has been already said, what an 
immensely ramified classification would result from an at- 
tempt to subdivide these two great classes.^ And yet this 
fourth order of thought is as nothing compared to those 
much higher orders which are reached by the adult, and 
especially by learned men. 

ARTICLE II. 

MENTAL. PROCESSES IN THE FORMATION OF COGNITIONS OF THE FOURTH 

ORDER. 

Section 1.— Analytic Judgments. 

302. As synthesis is the method proper to the mind in 
possession of the third order of cognitions, so analysis is 
the method proper to it when it has reached those of the 
fourth order, in accordance with the law already laid down, 
that to all the uneven numbers in the orders of cognition 
belong synthetic judgments, and to all the even ones ana- 
lytic judgments. 

Let us begin by noting the difference between analytic 
judgments of the second order and those of the fourth. 

The analytic judgments of the second order are pure 
abstractions; those of the fourth are elementary decomposi- 
tions. The difference between these two modes of analytic 
judgment is immense, and it consists in this : 

In abstraction the mind attends to one part only of its 
conception and neglects the remainder. Thus, having formed 
the conception of a body, I may confine my abstraction to 
its color, and make of the latter an abstract existence. 

1 It is evident that the first of these classes must have the same number of sub- 
divisions as the cognitions of the third order (a subdivision which has seven 
branches, as shown in no. 254), and accord witli tlie various modes in wliich those 
seven branches are connected together. The second class is likewise subdivided 
into the seven classes of cognitions of the third order, and the relations of each 
with the classes of the orders below. This indication should be enough to make 
the intelligent reader understand how innumerable and varied are the cognitions 
which the human mind succeeds in forming, so as to become incomprehensible 
even to itself. 



ABSTRACTION AND DECOMPOSITION. 219 

In elementary decomposition, on the other hand, the mind 
IS fixed on t]ie whole of the object conceived, and divides it 
into parts. Thus, after having judged a certain object to 
be a colored body, I can further divide substance from 
accident m the object, and say, this object is composed 
of two parts, substance and the accident, color. 

In the above example of abstraction, my mind dwelt on 
the color, and nothing more ; but, when I judged a given 
object to be a colored body (a synthesis of the third grade) 
I must have thought at the same time of the abstract color 
and the subsisting object in which I placed it. So, when I 
now say that the object has two parts, I fix my attention 
equally on the substance and the accident, and, moreover 
recognize their relation. ' 

The study of this relation becomes afterwards an inex- 
haustible source of knowledge, which goes on increasing 
through the whole of life. 

Until I had gained the faculty of perceiving individually 
subsisting entities (first order), I could not compare them, 
nor could I make such a comparison when I abstracted 
Irom them their qualities (second order) ; for my mind 
dwelt on the latter, abstracted and divided from the indi- 
vidual entities, and the entities themselves escaped me 
By putting together again the entities and their abstracted 
qualities (third order), I once more brought the whole entity 
before me. But my mind having reached this stage, and 
having present to it both the abstract qualities and the 
entities themselves, I am able to confront them with each 
othei^ and to recognize by comparison their correlativity. 
^03. This most fertile process of comparison between 
things (a process which pours a flood of light into the 
mind), can begin only with the fourth order of cognitions.^ 

But if t^T^'f T ^'''^"'^ ^'''''•)' "^^^^ ^^ something resembling comparisons 
But, .f we look closer into it, we find that it is not a comparison of the tMn^ 



220 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLES OF METHOD. 

There is another reason why comparison cannot be made 
earlier, viz. : that the human mind does not recognize duality 
till it has reached the third order (nos. 268, 269). 

In the fourth order, not only do we distinguish, through 
comparison, between substance and accident, between being 
and the mode of being in the thing itself, but we begin to 
analyze also the degree in which the entity participates in 
the predicate we attribute to it ; so that, for example, we 
can distinguish the degree in which two bodies participate 
in the red color, or any other qualities which can be predi- 
cated ^ of them. 

The child, then, at this period, begins not onl}^ to ana-, 
lyze entit}^, but also its modes, that which can be predi- 
cated of it. 

Section 2. — Synthetic Judgments. 

304. Just as in the preceding (third) order of cognitions 
the process of analysis went on, it is evident that s^mthesis, 
for which it has prepared the material, will take place in 
the present order. 

One of the products of the anatysis of the third order was 
the abstract conception of action. This conception of action, 
thus abstracted, is applied to entities and predicated of them, 
and thus synthetic judgments are formed. 

The s^mthesis thus formed is the same for real objects 
(as, for instance, when, at the mere sight of the fire, I attrib- 
ute to it the action of heating, as for purely ideal objects) ; 
as, for instance, if I should imagine a thing and attribute 

themselves, which are left aside, biit of the qualities abstracted from them ; and 
these can be abstracted from any one thing without comparing it with another, 
since the attention is limited to a quality of the thing, and does not extend to the 
whole thing. The description given in the New Essay (nos. 180 and foil.) of the 
mental process of comparison shows the necessity of having, 1. the quality or 
abstract entity in the mind ; 2. the perception of two subjects ; 3. the comparison 
of both with the abstract quality. 

1 Predicate means to me that which is predicated of anytliing. I do not use 
the word in the Aristotelian sense. 



HYPOTHETICAL REASONING. 221 

to it the heating property. This shows how immensely the 
kind of synthesis formed at this period extends the power 
of the intellectual imagination (ideation), making it possible 
for the mind to attribute to the things it has created for 
itself activities which either are not included in the concep- 
tion of them, or, if they are included, can yet be distin- 
guished from them in their ideal existence. 

This observation is important', as explaining the sudden 
development of the child's imagination at three years old. 

Skction 3. — Hypothetical Ratiocination. 

305. At this age the mind appears first to conceive hypo- 
thetical ratiocination, or, at least, the major premiss of it. 

The child has already in the preceding period become 
acquainted with the number two (nos. 263 and foil.). It 
would seem, then, that he could at that age recognize the 
relation expressed in the major premiss of the hypothetical 
syllogism; i. e., that the existence of one thing is the con- 
dition of the existence of another, and all the more easily 
that, in feeling, the two things are already bound together 
and conditioned by the unitive force of the subject. Hence, 
the mind has only to analyze, as it were, its own feehng, 
in order to know l^oth the conditioning and conditioned ele- 
ments of it,^ an analysis, however, which it cannot perform 
with certainty before having reached the fourth order of 
cognitions ; for the mind must : 1st, perceive the feeling ; 
2d, distinguish the two things joined together (3d order) ; 

1 " Two events have followed each other immediately on several occasions. 
The first soon excites in the child the expectation of the second, and, hence, there 
arises for him an abundant source of pains and pleasures of which we are, for 
him, the authors. 1 have already said that the child is slowly enlightened by the 
lessons of experience in early infancy, because it is only very tardily that he draws 
from the facts he knows a general consequence which shall serve him as a rule of 
action in new cases. This would be an act of judgment above his capacity, and 
he has simply the recollection of the association of the impressions which have 
followed each other." — Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. III., c. iii. 



222 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

3d, observe that, given the one, the other must be there 
also ; take away the one, the other must go ; and not till it 
has gone through all these stages can it pronounce : If such 
a thing is (or happens, or is done), then the other is, etc., 
which is the major premiss of the hypothetical syllogism. 

306. The hypothetical syllogism gives an immense de- 
velopment to voluntary activity ; for it is only when the mind 
begins to form hypotheses that conditional, as distinct from 
absolute volitions, can arise ; and the same applies to whims 
of all kinds. Before this period the child has no whims ; he 
wills simply, and, therefore, strongly. 

Although this conditioning of volitions lessens their force, 
and is so far a loss of energy, we find a compensation in 
their greater regularity ; in their being guided by a stronger 
light of reason. They begin to be connected and subordi- 
nated, — an immense gain to moral development. 

ARTICLE III. 

OBJECTS OF THE COGNITIONS OF THE FOURTH ORDEB. 

Section 1. — Reality and Ideality. 
^.—Differences. 

307. In the preceding period the child has learned to 
know the dual number. 

It is necessary to know one and two objects, before we 
can compare them with each other and find then- differences. 
As this process of comparison begins at the fourth order, 
it is only at this period that we can obtain the mental pro- 
duct of the differences of things. 

We have before said enough to show how much easier 
it is to know the similarities of things than their differences. 
But those who have followed up to this point the march of 
the child's intellectual development, and its products, as 
described by us, must have gained by their own reflection 
a yet stronger conviction of this important truth, so con- 



BrFFERENCE DISCOVERED. 223 

trary to the common prejudice of philosophers, who assume 
that likeness and unlikeness are found by the same mental 
process. 

This prejudice arises from not considering that what is 
like in several objects may be apprehended and noted by 
the mind in two ways, either as a simple quality (more 
generally a predicable one) , or as a quality which we know 
to exist in several objects, making them alike. ^ 

Now, to know likeness in this second way, it is assuredly 
necessary to go through the same process by which we recog- 
nize difference; but the case is quite different if we gain our 
knowledge in the first way. This is of the simplest kind, 
and belongs to the second order of cognitions ; for it con- 
sists in fixing our intellectual attention on a single quality 
of one or more things, taking no heed of their other parts 
or of their number. In this operation, we only repeat the 
same act of attention to the identical quality in each one 
of the objects passing before the eyes, without in the least 
attending to their number or comparing them together. 

Differences^ on the contrary, can be discerned only by 
comparing various things and noting what it is in which 
they all differ. 

B. — Numbers. 

308. The number three belongs to this order, the child 
having in the previous one learned to know distinctly the 
number two. 

He arrived at this by adding one to one, an operation 
which he can always repeat, and which leads him to numer- 
ation, without, however, attaining a distinct knowledge of 
the higher numbers, which remain vague in his mind. In 
the same manner, he can now arrive at the knowledge of 

1 strictly speaking, the latter is the only way by which we arrive at knowing 
likeness; but it is commonly believed that we know it so soon as we know the 
element which is like. It is not observed that we cannot know this till we know 
that it is like, i. e., that it exists alike in two or more objects. 



224 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

three^ by adding one to two, or two to one, and the latter 
operation, once learned, becomes a general formula by which 
he can rise through the scale of numbers, always repeating 
the addition of two, and thus learning to know them by a 
new relation. 

C. — Collections. 

309. With the science of numbers arises the knowledge 
of collections of like objects. 

The child will henceforth have a distinct idea of collec- 
tions composed of two, and those composed of three, objects ; 
but as 3^et he will have only a confused idea of those com- 
posed of larger numbers. He will, indeed, be able to dis- 
cern the many and the few ; for, having a confused idea of 
more numerous collections, and a clear idea of two or three 
things, he will easih^ recognize that there are collections 
more numerous than those he has a clear knowledge of. 

D. — Means. 

310. Before this the child could not have the conception 
of means ; but it is possible for him now, because he hence- 
forth knows two things, the one of wdiich conditions the 
other (no. 305) . This again immensely increases his mental 
activity ; for now he can not only instinctively, as before, but 
by an intellectual calculation, subordinate a means to an 
end. He cannot, however, as 3^et subordinate a series of 
means, each to the other ; this requires reflection belonging 
to a higher order. 

E. — Intellectual Perception of One's Self (of the I proper). 

311. So far as I know, the age at which man perceives 
himself has never been accurately examined by philoso- 
phers. They have generally accepted it as a settled thing, 
requiring no proof, that man perceives himself from the 
first moment of his existence, and that he could perceive 
nothing without having first perceived himself. 

But these gratuitous suppositious are not supported by 



PERCEPTION OE SELF. 225 

exact observation of this important fact. On the contrary, 
it is certain that man perceives and understands many other 
things before he perceives and understands himself, and that 
he does not know the true vahie of the monosyllable / before 
having reached the fourth or fifth order of cognitions. 

Moreover, observation gives us another result, which is, 
that the knowledge man acquires of the / varies both in 
degree and form at different ages, and, therefore, that this 
word / (like so many others), pronounced l^y him at one time 
of his life, has a meaning different from that which it bears 
at another.-^ 

We must now say something on this head, and for this 
purpose we will briefly take up again the analysis of the /, 
given already elsewhere.^ 

The / expresses the human being who is speaking, and 
who names himself as existing, as acting.^ 

1 This observation appears to me of the utmost importance for logic; for it ex- 
plains the reason why men who are quite honest can talk at length on some subjects 
without arriving at a common understanding. To discover and determine the 
value each man gives to iroi-ds, at the different periods of life, would be a great and 
most important aid to the art of education. The reader will have perceived that 
we are endeavoring to lay down the elements of such an aid, and will, perhaps, 
in view of our object, condone our dwelling on certain subtle portions of it which 
cannot have much uiterest for those who do not enter into our more remote views. 
Words change their meanings in men's mouths, not only according to their various 
stages of intellectual life, but also through other circumstances. To find these 
out, and to track prejudice and error to their most secret recesses, is to prepare the 
way for agreement between honest-minded men. So moral is the office of logic ! 
How much of new dignity would this science i*eceive, if those who taught it to the 
young revealed, step by step, its natural co-ordination with virtue and the peace 
of the human race ! 

2 Anthropolofji/, nos. 805-811. 

3 AVhen the Chaldean translator of Genesis gave the famous passage in that 
book (ch. ii. v. 7) thus : " And he (Adam) was made a speal-'nu/ * soul," he showed 
that he conceived man, not in his earliest, natural state, but in that which follows 
the earliest, when, having perceptions of external things, his organs of speech are 
stirred without any deliberation on his part, or seeking of words. Apart from his 
external perceptions and his inward sense of divine grace, the first man must have 
heard God himself speak, and have learnt immediately from him a part, at least, 
of language. All this, however, does not necessarily presuppose the perception of 
the /, but may take place at an earlier period. 

* 2fote of Translator. — In the English Authorized Version it is "man became a liv'mg soul." 



226 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Now, the human being is composed primarily of two 
principles : ( 1 ) the animal principle ; ( 2 ) the spiritual prin- 
ciple. These two are, however, so related that the first is 
bound to the second, and the second exercises its strength 
and dominion over the first, in such sort that both can be 
reduced to one sole and supreme principle, — the principle of 
intelligence, which has power also over the animal principle 
conjoined to it. This supreme principle, together with the 
inferior elements bound up with it, is ma?i, but is not yet 
the /. 

The two principles indicated are both feelings, and, there- 
fore, man is never without feeling. He himself is an intel- 
ligent-volitional feeling, which governs another sensitive- 
instinctive feeling. But this sentient man is not the /, 
because the / is not a feeling ; it is a consciousness. 

312. How and when does man, then, form that conscious- 
ness of himself which he afterwards expresses by the 
monosyllable 19 I will first state a plausible reason for the 
belief that lie forms it very early, or rather that he cannot be 
without it. There can be no doubt that, as I have shown in 
my Ideology^ from the first, ideal being is manifested in man. 
To say that ideal being is manifested in him^ is to say that 
ideal being manifests itself in a substantive feeling, and that 
this feeling is himself. This substantive feeling and the 
being effulgent in it are, therefore, united. It might seem 
to follow that this union would suffice to make the subject 
perceive himself, if it be true, as I have affirmed elsewhere, 
that "feeling is as the scene on which objects appear and 
become visible to us." ^ I do not cancel the latter state- 
ment. It is certain that nothing can be intellectually per- 
ceived by us, but that which affects our substantive feeling. 
Hence, I grant that the feeling itself, being that through 

1 See Opuscoli Filosofici, Vol. I. pp. 99 and following, of the Milan edition, 
1827. Teodicea, Lib. L 



CONSCIOUSNESS OF SELF. 227 

which the understanding sees whatever things it does see, 
itself maybe seen, without needing to be presented to us by 
any other feeling. 

But, first, in the substantive feeling we must distinguish 
the act by which it sees being from its other acts. Now the 
act by which it sees being can never be that by which it 
sees itself ; it is rather an act which excludes the vision of 
itself. In so far, then, as feeling directly goes out towards 
being, it is unknown to itself. But, be it carefully noted 
here, man, and, above all, the Ego^ is essentially the principle 
which sees being ; it is the substantive-intelligent feeling. 
Deprived of that feeling, man ceases to exist. He has no 
consciousness of himself until he has the consciousness of 
being intelligent. In order, then, to attain such a conscious- 
ness, the substantive feeling must not only see being, but 
must see itself as seeing it.^ It is not enough for this that 
it should be present at the scene whereon things become 
visible ; it must, besides, by a new act of its own, attribute 
the being it sees to itself as seeing being, and through this 
attribution illumine and see itself in being. This new act 
required of it must be its own, not given by nature, but a 
spontaneous impulse due to some want or stimulus. This 
is the important operation it has still to perform, in order 
that it may perceive itself. 

While, then, all that falls within his feeling is capable of 
being seen by man, and feeling itself, seeing being (itself), 
enjoys this advantage, it must be added, that the con- 
dition of this vision or perception is a new act proceeding 
from within the subject, an act of the faculty of attention^ 
concentrating and fixing itself upon the object it wants to 
see ; and by this act, the mind (the substantive feeling) 

1 Let it not be supposed that this alone is sufficient to enable man to ex- 
press what he sees : he still requires much more observation of what he sees 
internally, and the words to express accurately what he sees. All the efforts 
of philosophy, and of the centuries, must be applied to the elucidation of this 
great fact. 



228 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

beholds itself as seeing being, together with the being seen 
and contained in the latter, as in its own genus. 

Will, then, this act of self-knowledge, involved as it 
is, be easier than the acts by which the mind knows other 
things ? 

313. The sentient man works through knowledge, and he 
knows first the things which are needful to him. But it is 
not in the least necessary for him that he should know him- 
self ; what he needs are other things which he has not but 
wants to have, and exerts himself to obtain, and must know 
in order to work for them. He does not seek himself, be- 
cause he possesses himself ; but he seeks the things which 
complete this self, which supply what it lacks, meets all its 
deficiencies and limitations. Man is an incomplete being ; 
for if he sufficed to himself, he would seek nothing beyond ; 
he would have no motive activity, but solely a statical one. 
His very sensations of pain and pleasure are not conceived 
by him except as connected with external objects, and it is 
in these that he supposes them to exist (no. 103). 

Man, then, can be roused only by language to turn his 
attention on himself. 

But language itself is not learned by the child all at once ; 
he must pass through several orders of cognitions before he 
can understand all the parts of speech. 

We have already seen that, at the second order of cog- 
nitions, he learns only substantive, or rather substantiated, 
nouns ; nor is it until the third order that he arrives at form- 
ing an abstract idea of the action of things. Hence it is only 
then that he can name his own actions, and he can still only 
name them objectively, the same as the actions of all other 
things. He has, indeed, the feeling of his own actions, 
which is simply an extension of his substantive feeling, but 
nothing more. His actions are external, and fall under his 
senses like the actions of others ; he himself^ on the other 



CONSCIOUSNESS OF SELF. 229 

hand is internal, — is an invisible principle producing them. 
Hence he knows his own actions before he knows that they 
are his own, — before his understanding refers them to him- 
self ; for he himself does not yet exist for his understand- 
ing. He arrives, indeed, in the third stage of cognition, at 
attributing the actions to a being, but not at observing, 
among beings, which of them is himself. 

In the fourth order of cognition, certainly not earlier, and 
perhaps later, he is able to perceive himself as the acting 
principle, by means of language ; that is, he can recall his 
own attention from without to his own motive feeling, and 
thus perceive that certain actions have for their cause that 
feeling which constitutes himself, and in this differ from 
others that are not so produced. The first and elementary 
cognition of himself by man consists, then, in this perception 
of " himself in action," ^ the word himself meaning here the 
substantive feeling which constitutes man as perceived by 
that same man. 

314. This motor feeling can be very well expressed by 
the word /; but this word has not yet the full meaning 
which belongs to it, and which men in a later stage of 
development will attribute to it. 

The / is never uttered alone, but always with some verb 
expressed or implied,^ a manifest proof of the legitimacy of 
the method by which we have explained its origin. The 
first / is then "the substantive feeling in action, perceiving 

1 When St. John Chrysostom explained the words in Genesis ii. 7: Factus est 
homo in animam viventem by factus est homo i» animam ojjerantein (in Geii. 
Homily xiii.) he expressed the conception of man i^_ the state he is in previous to 
the use of speech. 

2 In the ancient languages the personal pronouns were enough without the 
addition of the verb to be ; a proof that the verb was contained in the conception 
of the pronoun, and did not require to be expressed ; for example, in Scripture 
God says "I the same" (X^n Oi^ Deut. xxxii. 39; Isai. xliii. 10) for "I am 
the same," and elsewhere we read, "Thou thyself, O Jehovah, our God!" 
nin nnX (Jerem. xiv. 22), i. e., " Thou art our God." Innumerable examples of 
the same kind might be added, in which the substantive verb is considered as 
included in the pronoun itself. 



230 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

and expressing itself." But, reflecting further on himself, 
man comes to know the identity of himself speaking and him- 
self spoken of and then the I receives a fuller meaning, and 
comes to signify the acting human being (the acting sub- 
stantive feeling) perceiving himself as acting and express- 
ing himself as such, knowing that he who speaks is the same 
as he who is spoken of. This meaning of the monosyllable 
I can be attributed to it only by the man who has reached, 
at least, the fifth order of cognitions. 

The inclusion of so many and such abstruse elements in 
this monosyllable explains why it is understood so late and 
with so much difficulty. 

I made the experiment on a man of over forty, half an 
idiot, named Stefano Birti. He could speak and understand ; 
but was not intelligent enough to compass the use of per- 
sonal pronouns. When he spoke of himself, it was always 
in the third person, by his name, Stefano ; he would say, for 
example : " Stefano is a good man," or " Stefano is poor" ; 
or "Stefano eats such a thing, or does so and so." Only 
when he pronounced Stefano he pointed to himself, and 
when he named others he pointed in the same way to them. 
I tried again and again to make him understand the use of 
the personal pronouns /, thou^ he. He would repeat them 
after me, but only mechanically, without being able to apply 
them, or showing the least inkling of their meaning. Sup- 
posing, I said to him, " I did such a thing," he would repeat 
"I did such a thing"; if I said, "Stefano, were you in 
such a place ? " instead of answering me he would repeat, 
" Stefano, were you in such a place?" But, if I put the 
question in the third person, he would answer me and reply 
to the question.^ 

1 Note of Translator. — These facts are confirmed by the most ordinary obser- 
vations on little children. The use of personal pronouns marks an epoch in their 
intellectual development. It was noted, as the surest sign of very unusual precocity, 
in a little grand-niece of my own, that she used the pronoims / and you at sixteen 
months, the ordinary age being two years and a half or three, and often later. 



DIFFICULTY WITH PRONOUNS. 231 

315. I have before stated that we find in the peoples of 
antiquity a gradation of intelligence similar to that which 
we observe in children, and that ancient languages retain the 
traces of it. We find similar traces of the infancy of nations 
with regard to our present subject, in the fact that, the older 
a language is, the less do the persons introduced as speaking 
make use of the personal pronouns / and thou. It is for 
this reason that the use of the third person, rather than 
the first, is so common as the mode of address in Oriental 
languages.-^ 

If we now turn our attention to children, we shall easily 
perceive the difficulty they find in using correctly the per- 
sonal pronouns / and tlioii. I am glad to quote, in preference 
to my own, the observations of others, where they are con- 
firmed by my own, such testimony precluding the accusation 
that I bend the facts to support my theory. The follow- 
ing words, which completely bear me out, were written by a 

1 The Biblical scholars of Germany have observed that, when our Lord in the 
Gospels speaks of himself in the third person as "the Son of Man," he uses a 
form of speech proper to Oriental languages. (Paulus, Exeg. Handb. 1, 6, p. 465 ; 
Fritzche, in Matt. p. 320) ; but these biblicists, full of apparent knowledge and most 
real ignoi-ance, can never rise to the comprehension of the force of that expression 
as used by the Man-God in speaking oi" himself. Let me here make another obsei'- 
vation on the genius of Oriental languages. Even when they use the pronouns / 
and tho^i, they easily mix them up with the third person, as if they had not yet 
attained sufficient skill in the art of applying them. This is apparent each time 
that the relative pi-onoun, expressed or understood, follows the personal pronouns. 
We will tnke our examples as before from the Hebrew. In Ezekiel (xxi. 25), the 
prince of Israel is thus addressed : " Ajid thou, O deadly wounded, wicked one, the 
prince of Israel, whose day is come." This passage, if translated literally, would 
not be rendered, by "whose day is come," but "to whom conies his day," in the 
third person. In Isaiah likewise, the passage (liv. 1) translated in the Vulgate: 
kmda sterilis, qua non parts: decanta laudem et hymmim, quse non pariebas, 
tvould be rendered literally from the Hebrew : " Sing, O barren, she who did not 
oear ; break forth into singing, neigh, she that did not travail with child," 1£)1 HjJ, 
where the second person is changed to the third. In the following passage, also 
from Isaiah (xxviii. 16), the first jierson is in the same manner changed into the 
third: " Behold me, he who laid the foundation," "ID!) "'DUn. There are many 
other cases in Hebrew where the sentence begxui in the first or second person ends 
in the third, as may be seen in the Hebraists. The ancients had a difficulty in 
holding firmly to the first and second persons, 



232 ON THE EULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

woman who assuredly had no thought of supporting me in 
her observations and writings, and whose remarks I am 
always glad to quote, for their general truth and sagacity : 

" That which most puzzles the poor child's brain is the use of 
pronouns. Me and / especially remain for a long while as in a 
fog to him. These words being applicable solely to him who 
utters them, they are not applied to the child in speaking to him 
of himself. He sees their object changed at every moment, 
without ever himself becoming that object. ^ Hence he never 
thinks of using them. Even when he wants to designate his own 
person, he considers himself, as it were, from without,^ and speaks 
of himself by his name, as he would speak of any one else. Give 
to Albert, take Albert, that is his way of expressing himself. I 
have heard a child, to whom those about him said thov, always use 
the pronoun tJiou in speaking of himself. It would be curious to 
observe the introduction of /." ^ 

F.— Time. 

316. It is only at this period that the child's mind can 
begin to form the conception of time. This conception 
is not formed, at first, by comparing the three parts of 
time, the present, the past, and the future, but by com- 
paring two of them only, the present with the past, or 
the present with the future. This is as much as can be 
compassed by the child who has reached only the fourth 
order of its cognitions. 

At the third order, he has attained a clear idea of the 

1 The /, in fact, presupposes, as we have seen, 1st, that he who uses it has the 
abstract conception of tlie act of speaking ; 2d, that he refers this act of speaking 
to a speaking subject; 3cl, tliat he understands tliat the / indicates precisely tliat 
speaking subject. Who does not see how difficult it must be for the little child 
to do all this, and even more than this, as we have shown in the analysis of 
the I? 

2 This observation contains an entire demonstration of our ideological theory, 
which shows that the understanding has for its form the essential object, which 
ia universal being. 

' Mme. Necker de Saussure, L. II., c, vi, 



CONSCIOUSNESS OF TIME. 233 

number two ; at the fourth, he can compare two disthict 
things and perceive their differences. The operation of 
distmguishnig time present from time past, or time present 
from time future, belongs to this fourth stage; but to 
distinguish all three periods, by comparing them together, 
IS absolutely impossible before the fifth stage. 

317. Let it be noted, moreover, that we are not now 
speaking of time as entirely abstracted from events, but 
of time considered as a quality, as predicable of events. 
Ihat one event ceases to exist when another begins, or 
that one event succeeds another, remains stamped as a 
fact on the retentive faculty of the child, by the mere 
imitative force of his animal nature. Later on, events are 
hnked together by the associations of ideas ; but this is not 
yet the conception of time in events. The child must note 
the event which took place yesterday, and distinguish it 
from that which takes place to-day, bv comparing the one 
with the other ; or he must distinguish the event of to-day 
from that which will happen to-morrow, before we can 
say that he has formed the conception of time present 
and time past, or of the present and the future. 

Now, in the first place, time is a predicate of events 
which does not fall under the senses ; it is a limitation 
ot the super-sensible existence of things. The mind, there- 
fore, requires language to fix and retain it. Moreover, the 
child's power of attention is but little developed as vet 
and the small force it can exert is whollv absorbed in 
the objects that are present, so that scarcely anv remains 
for what is past and for what is to come. Henie, obser- 
vation shows that children are late in distinguishing one 
tune from another. 

"It is a peculiarity of the infant imagination that it is 
occupied solely with the present, differing thus widely from 
ours, ever stretching forwards or backwards, recalling the 



234 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

past to life or anticipating tlie future. The little child is 
a stranger to tlie events of the day before. An accident 
which has happened by its fault is a fact like any other, 
which it has nothing more to do with. It is new-born 
each morning with the feeling of innocence, and feels itself 
justified of all wrong-doing by simply saying, ' It was yes- 
terday.'"^ 

We find another proof of the difficulty which the child 
experiences in marking time properly, in the steps by 
which he acquires the use of language, the true mirror of 
his conception. For a long time, he uses the verb in the 
wjinitive, and not until much later does he express the 
various tenses. We find the same thing in the languages 
of some peoples backward in intellectual culture. In the 
most ancient languages, also, the verb has but few tenses, 
which are not well determined, and the use of which is 
uncertain.^ 

(r. — First Definite Principles, drawn from the Ideas of Actions. 

318. Ideas, already numerous in the child's mind, very 
soon become principles, by which, as we have seen, he hence- 
forth judges and acts (nos. 270 and foil.). For an idea, 
however, to acquire the form and value of a principle, it 
must remain a certain time in the human mind ; its appli- 
cation belongs, in fact, to the next higher order of cog- 
nitions, to that of the idea itself. Hence, the ideas of 
the third order become principles in the fourth. 

Amongst those ideas we found those which belong to 
actions (nos. 260 and foil.) . The most important principles, 
then, which the child acquires in the fourth stage of cog- 
nitions are those which he works out from the ideas of 
actions. 

1 Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. III., c. v. 

2 In Hebrew, there are only the past and the future, the simple present being 
understood m the participles or the infinitives, the nouns or pronouns, or else 
expressed by one or the other of the two tenses, 



IDEAS OF ACTIONS. 235 

When he has learned to know the actions of things, and 
has seen the same actions repeated many times, he begins 
to conceive the constant method which governs them, and 
is able to foresee in what manner a given object before him 
will act, what force it will exert, what effects will follow 
from this cause. In this manner, he gradually sets limits to 
the power of the various objects known to him, and he 
ceases to expect more from them than certain definite opera- 
tions. Should they produce any unusual effects, he wonders 
at them, as strange to his belief and expectation. 

319. Until the child has learned to connect certain things 
with certain actions, his credulity is unbounded : nothing 
seems impossible to him. When he hears his mother speak 
as if she knew what he had done out of her sight, or his 
nurse says to him that her little finger has told her of some 
piece of naughtiness he has committed, why is he not 
surprised? Simply because he has not yet firmh^ grasped 
the limitation of bodies precluding their existence in more 
than one place, or the limitation of the senses precluding 
hearing beyond a certain distance, or the limitation in 
the action of the little finger precluding the power of 
knowing or communicating things. I remember several 
incidents of my own childhood which prove how slowly 
children set a limit to the actions of things. My uncle 
Ambrose, who took such care of my childhood, was very 
tall, and I, in my childish belief, deemed his strength 
irresistible. One day, when I was playing about bis knees 
with the freedom he always allowed me, he said, becom- 
ing grave : " Be quiet, or I will give 3^ou a fillip that w ill send 
you out of that window " (one which was standing open in 
front of him). The threat did not frighten me, for 1 knew 
he loved me too well to do me harm ; but I was amazed at 
the strength of his fingers, and went a]x)ut gravely telling 
every one that ni}^ uncle was so strong that, with a single 



236 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

fillip lie could seiid people out of the window, aud I believed 
it witiiout the slightest hesitation. 

It is experience, then, that limits in the child's mind the 
action of things, and, previous to this experience, he places 
no such limitations, but believes everything possible ; his 
credulity is boundless. His faith in the assertions of others 
depends very much, as we have seen, on his affection for 
them ; but no affection would move his understanding to 
assent to that which he believed to be absurd. He does not 
believe it absurd that objects should have certain virtues 
and faculties which we adults know them not to have, until 
he has learned from the facts themselves the non-existence 
of such attributes. These facts deserve to be well med- 
itated on, for they are pregnant with important conse- 
quences, supporting the doctrines of ideology and anthro- 
pology. And, indeed, two things remain to be explained in 
the credulity of the child prior' to experience : 1st, why he 
believes everything to be possible ; 2d, why or how expe- 
rience brings limitation to this possibility. 

No ideological theory can give an adequate answer to the 
first of these queries, except that which makes ideal inde- 
terminate being innate in man ; which heing contains and 
exhibits in itself universal possibility. So long, then, as 
the child has no other rule of judgment, except this of 
mere, bare possibility innate in him, he will judge every- 
thing to be possible ; he will believe everything, excepting 
only what seems to him intrinsically or metaphysically 
impossible ; for to that even the child will never give 
his assent. Without this innate idea he could not, and 
wonld not, judge anything to be possible. Here, then, 
is one more fact, in addition to the innumerable others 
which I have adduced elsewhere, in confirmation of the 
philosophical theory I have propounded, and it would l)e 
for the honor of Italy, that the assertions printed and re- 



LIMITATIONS TO PASSIBILITY. 237 

printed among ns, to the effect that this theory is uusnp- 
ported b}^ proofs derived from experience, and rests only 
on reasoning by exchision, in which it is douiitful whether 
every part is fairly enumerated,^ should come to an end. 

320. In order to answer the second query, we must recall 
what I have said elsewhere on the origin and the strength 
of the principle of analogy.^ When man finds a given 
effect constantly occurring through a long space of time, 
he becomes convinced that it will always occur in the 
same way, and, in consequence, if the event is periodical, 
as, for instance, the rising of the sun, he predicts that, 
when the period returns, the event will take place. The 
reason of this is, that the mind conceives the cause of 
the event ; it conceives that the event cannot stand alone ; 
that it must ultimately be the effect of one or more sub- 
stances ; and it has an intimate notion of the stability 
of substances. Seeing the constant order of nature, it does 
not hesitate to judge it invariable, unconsciously performing 
this whole process of reasoning: i. e., "that which occurs 
in this universe is the effect of something constant ; there- 
fore, it will continue to occur in future." 

It. is by a process somewhat similar to this, beginning 
in his infancy and going on throughout his long develop- 
ment, that man makes up his principles, opinions, and 
belief, regarding the working of things. Seeing effects 
occur always in the same way, certain occurrences always 
proceeding from certain objects, certain others always 
absent, he connects the actions with the objects, the 

1 That the enumeration of all the parts is complete should, I think, be evident 
to the reader of the New Essay, nos. 467 and foil. No one has ever been able to 
impugn my argument (an argument which does not stand alone, but is conjoined 
with so many others) ; and yet there have been many wlio, with a recklessness and 
presumption which would be incredible anywhere else, but, to our shame, are 
only too credible among us Italians, have thrown vague doubts upon it, wholly 
unsupported by proofs. 

2 See Treatise Delia Coscienza Morale, nos. 198 and foil., Logica, no. COG. 



238 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

entities, aud arrives at certain persuasions, which, if 
formulated, would run thus : This entity has the power to 
produce these effects and not others ; the potency of this 
entity extends only so far, has such and such limits, such 
and such a nature, form, laws, etc. Whenever man has 
succeeded in establishing for himself one or the other of 
these principles, he has restricted in so far the sphere of 
his credulity ; for, if any one should tell him of an occur- 
rence in contradiction with the principles he has formed 
regarding the action of beings, he would set it down as 
impossible and refuse to believe it. Thus, if I should say 
that a spider had walked through the air without holding 
on to a thread, I shall not be believed by any one who 
had laid down in his mind the principle, that any animal 
without wings cannot move freely through the air.-^ 

321. Who does not see that we have here the guiding 
thread to a history of human credulity and incredulity 
which would be of the utmost value? 

This history has the same epochs in the individual as 
in the whole human race. The infant begins by believing 
everything which is not manifestly contradictory (for even 
the infant never unites yes and ?io, but feels their antago- 
nism) ; then it forms opinions which limit the powers of 

1 Let me be permitted to show, from the words of a noble Italian philosopher, 
how the piTjiciple of analogy extends through human life, and how great is the 
importance of giving it a direct application. " Nevertheless," says Pallavicini, 
"this principle is true, and God teaches it to us through the mouth of the wise 
man: tJiat ifhlch has been shall be. For by this maxim human life is governed; 
on it is founded the structure of govermnents, and the general conduct of the 
people, whether rich or poor, whether young or old ; and in whatever circum- 
stances. On this maxim philosophers base their accounts of the common usages 
of men ; those who reign look to it m the constitution of their laws; jurists 
depend upon it in prescribing to magistrates the rule for judging from circum- 
stances the truth of facts which have not come under their experience; by this 
are guided doctors, navigators, the leaders and professors of all the arts of con- 
jecture, in constructing the rules of their j^rofessions ; the sole counsellor of all 
these is the past, the ' sagacious foreteller of the future,' as I liear you named 
it yesterday." — Pallavicini, Del Bene, Rome, 1G44, p. 232. 



IDEAS DRAWN FROM ACTION. 239 

the things -it perceives. These opinions remain incomplete 
Tor certain recondite reasons which we have not time to 
point ont here ; they are a web still on the loom, so to 
speak ; none of them are yet very conclusive or firmly 
established in the mind. By degrees, however, they 
become conclusive and stable ; but this stability and con- 
clusiveness are not attained until we know, not only that 
" a given entity has a certain determined potency and 
mode of action," but have concluded that "it has no 
other mode of action, no other degree of potency, than 
those it has constantly manifested to us." It is this nega- 
tive portion of our opinions on the action of things that 
gives them firmness and conclusiveness. For, until I have 
added to my belief that a given entity is endowed with 
certain powers exercised in a certain manner, the judg- 
ment that it has no other powers and no other mode of 
action, my mind remains open to accept any new dis- 
covery concerning this entity, and to enlarge the powers 
I have previously attributed to it, and thus to modify 
and amplify my opinions about it. But, when my opinion 
is already made up, and I have arrived at an absolute, 
not a provisional^ persuasion that "a given being, i. e., a 
given species of being has no other mode or degree of 
action," then I shall no longer give credence to any one 
who tells me of any occurrence involving a different mode 
of action and a greater degree of power in that being. 
If, however, I myself should, with my own senses, verify 
the fact, without the possibility of denying it or explaining 
it otherwise, I should be obliged to alter my opinion, and 
to form a wholly new one concerning the efficiency of that 

object. 

322. Here we come to the three things which are both 

1 On the difference between prorlsioval and ahsolute assent, see the New 
Essay, nos. 1303 and foil., Lotjic, nos. 141 and foil. 



240 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD 

interesting and have an important bearing on our investi- 
gation : — (1) What is it that determines the period at 
which man comes to a conchisive opinion on the efticiency 
of things? (2) To what degree are those opinions firmly 
impressed and unchangeable? (3) When and how does 
this process take place rationally and when irrationally? 
With respect to the first query, it is certain that neither 
individuals nor races advance with equal steps, and, there- 
fore, that the operations proper to human nature, such as 
those of which we are speaking, although they take place 
alike in all human individuals, do not take place in all at 
the same period; and this holds good in the development 
of races also. It would be impossible to determine all the 
circumstances and causes which lead an individual (and the 
same may be said of a nation) to take such a step exactly 
in such a year, on such a day, at such a moment, the 
minute circumstances which influence the human mind being 
infinite. It would, however, be a valuable inquiry, though 
beyond the scope of this work, to ascertain the fixed laws 
which undou])tedly govern these occurrences. 

323. With respect to the second query, as to the degree 
of strength with which the opinion concerning the limits 
of efficiency in things is held as final and conclusive, it 
varies with the age and with the individual. It may be 
said, generally, that the older a man grows, the more 
wedded he becomes to his opinion, and the more difficult 
it is for him to break it up and form a new one. It is 
hard for old people to accept new opinions, not only 
in philosophy, but in physical matters, especially if they 
live in a small circle of society, and lead a uniform life, 
with little variety in their surroundings. This fact, like 
so many others, results from the general law, — that the 
longer and the more frequently a man observes the same 
actions of the same beings, and no others, so much the 



IDEAS DRAWN FROM ACTION. 241 

Stronger is his conviction that the powers of those beings 
are limited to those actions, and cannot go beyond them 
or operate in any other manner. Tliis explains what 
experience demonstrates, that man begins his life with 
universal credulity, which gradually becomes less and less 
with his increasing years, and gives place to a principle 
of incredulity, the latter in mature age often becoming the 
predominate one.^ 

324. In answer to the third query respecting the rational, 
or irrational credulity or incredulity of man, it may be 
said in general : 

(1) That the credulity of the child is always rational 
because he has no reason for unbelief, and in him it is 
neither more nor less than the affirmation of absolute 
possibility^ the only possibility yet known to him. Now, 
even what is physically impossible is not impossible 
metaphysically, and the child, in thus affirming absolute 
possibiUty, affirms the truth. Thus, if any one assures 
him that he, the speaker, can fly, he feels no distrust, 
because he sees the thing as possible, and, being unable 
as yet to measure the powers of the person who addresses 
him, he has no alternative but to believe him on his 
word. 

(2) That the incredulity spontaneously awakened in the 
mind not distorted by passion, is also rational, because it 
does not affirm absolute impossibility, but only physical 
impossibility, and even this only provisionaUy . Thus, if a 

1 The word credulity involves the conception of faith in the assertions of 
others. This is another reason for the distrust of the old, who have had large 
experience of the falsehood of men and of the advantage they take of the 
mental wealaiess of age. But our argimient does not refer so much to the 
credence given to the word of others, as to the facility of formuig new opinions 
about the efficiency of things, whether on the testimony of others or on our 
own observations and experience, — observations and experience which are neg- 
lected in proportion as we expect less from them. And he who has fully made 
up his mind ceases to expect from them any fresh knowledge. 



242 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

man disbelieves in an ox flying through the air like an 
eagle, he does not deny the absolute possibility of the thing, 
but affirms that the powers of the. ox, as known to him by 
multiplied experience, are not such and so great as to over- 
come- its weight. 

(3) Irrational and erroneous incredulity begins whenever 
the man himself affirms that that which is physically impos- 
sible is also absolutely impossible, the passage from the one 
to the other being a culpable and self-interested exaggera- 
tion. It is the men of science, not the people, who fall into 
this error, nature thereby giving them a useful warning, if 
only they would attend it, not to boast too much of their 
superiority to other men, who retain as their heritage, not 
systematic science, but common sense. 

(4) There is another error that man falls into, when 
his judgment regarding physical impossibility is definitive, 
instead of being provisional. This again is an exaggera- 
tion, — the arbitrary decision of the passionate or conceited 
man ; for, in fact, our external experience is often incom- 
plete, and forces and powers remain occult in things, until 
revealed to us accidentally, to the confounding of our judg- 
ments, which have erred in setting certain absolute limits to 
nature. 

We have seen that benevolence inclines the child's heart 
to credulity. In like manner, malevolence inclines the adult 
to incredulity. But, as the former would not be possil)le, un- 
less there were a ground of possibility in the intellect of the 
child, so neither could the man's malevolence and hardness 
of heart make him so tardy to believe and assent to the truth, 
were it not that this tardiness rests on a real or supposed 
ground in the intellect, and this ground is physical impossi- 
bility, deduced from experience, which the man arbitrarily 
transforms, sometimes into absolute impossibility, sometimes 
into physical impossibility, not only probable and provisional. 



LIMITS OF POSSIBILITY. 243 

but certain and definitive, refusing every further experiment 
and shutting out any light by which the mind might receive 
better instruction and iUumination. 

Now, it is certain tliat the limitations we impose on the 
actions of things cannot be regarded as final, so long as we 
rest them on imperfect observation and experience, unsup- 
ported by other principles of reasoning. We have already 
said that the law of analogy produces only probal)ility, not 
certainty. ^ It follows that the conclusions derived from this 
law are alw^a^^s open to reconsideration upon new discoveries 
and new arguments : and, if we hold these conclusions as 
final, we shall deceive ourselves grievously. 

325. Meanwhile, if we observe what takes place in the 
mass of mankind, we shall find that they early form for 
themselves conclusions and principles ; but, with the increase 
of their knowledge and experience, they abandon these and 
form new ones, larger and more accurate, which approximate 
more and more to the truth and also to reason. This alter- 
nate process of forming exclusive and fixed opinions on the 
action of things, and of renouncing them to form others, is 
repeated more than once in the life of those who are continu- 
ally advancing in tlie study and knowledge of nature ; while, 
on the contrary, those whose culture remains stationary hold 
more and more stubbornly the opinions and principles they 
formed at first. 

The more fixed and narrow these early opinions become, 
the greater is the incredulity of him who holds them. There 
is a kind of incredulity which is the result of ignorance, that 
is, of opinions too fixed and exclusive concerning the action 
of things. If I should try to convince a peasant that the 
sun stands still and that the earth moves, that the earth has 
the form of a round ball and is inhabited over its whole sur- 
face, with other natural truths of the same kind, he would at 

1 On the value of this law, see Trattato della Coscienza Morale, nos. 488 and f oU, 



244 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

first think I was making game of him ; and, if I showed 
myself seriously convinced of these facts, he would simply 
shake his head and refuse to listen. The difficulty of be- 
lieving certain perfectly true things which are believed by 
the learned is to him insurmountable, and thus the incredu- 
lity of the ignorant is, under one aspect, greater than that of 
the scientific man. 

Man begins, then, with universal credulity concerning the 
actions of things, which he rapidly exchanges for a species 
of incredulity, as soon as he has firmly fixed and concluded 
his first opinions about natural occurrences. But, with the 
progress of knowledge, these first opinions are rectified and 
enlarged, and the human mind enters a new course, impel- 
ling it gentW back again from the incredulity of ignorance 
towards the primitive credulity of childhood, restored to it 
by a wider knowledge of the powers of nature. This credu- 
lity, increased by science, may itself go beyond its due lim- 
its ; and there have been men, reputed men of science, who 
have believed everything possible to nature, who have exag- 
gerated her powers, and, unsupported by any observation or 
experience, and even in opposition to all observation and all 
experience, would yet say : Who can know all the secrets 
of nature? Who can prove that no occult forces reside in 
her depths capable of producing phenomena of the most 
extraordinary kind ever witnessed? Such men, with all 
their knowledge, have gone back wholly to the universal 
credulity of childhood. I have but to mention one word 
here, animal magnetism^ to convince the reader that every- 
thing has been believed by certain men to be possible to the 
secret forces latent in matter, or in some way or another, 
in the universe. 

But, while many have firmly believed that science itself, 
the fruit of such arduous study, taught them that every- 
thing was possible and nothing impossible to nature, others 



INCREDULITY. 245 

have, with Hke dogmatic presumption, set their faces Uke a 
flint against any possibihties transcending the conclusions 
they themselves have arrived at regarding the powers of 
nature. Religious incredulity has found a fancied support, 
first in the one, and then in the other, of these errors. There 
have been unlielievers who denied miracles because, they 
said, we cannot tell how far natural forces extend, and there- 
fore the facts we term miraculous may be natural. And 
there have been others who have rejected miracles for the 
contrary reason, ?'. e., that the so-called miraculous events 
exceed the powers of nature, which are too well known to 
admit of any possibilities beyond. There is something ac- 
tually comical in the inexpressibly presumptuous ignorance, 
tricked out with grammatical pedantry and philological eru- 
dition, of the so-called rationalistic Biblicists of Germany, 
who frankly exclude from the Bible whatever they hold to 
be impossible, as measured by the rules of possibility they 
have arbitrarily established.^ 

Section 2. — Morality, Moral Principles, Conscience. 

326. So long as the child acts from natural impulses only, 
his action is spontaneous, and no moral struggle can arise 
in his mind. He will experience physical pain, he will fight, 

1 One of these rationalists, in a work pronounced to be impious by public 
opinion, has set his predecessors in Biblical rationalism by the ears, in order to 
raise on the ruins of their teaching a system of his own more absurd than all the 
rest. He, however, so far agrees with them as to exclude every supernatural oc- 
currence, on the followuig grounds : " W^e are now able to explain through natural 
causes those changes in the world and in man which were imagined at one time to 
be the work of God liimself, through the ministry of the angels." (D. F. Strauss, 
Vie de Jesus, etc., V. I. p. 1, Premiere legon, cap. i. § xvi.) Let us now consult 
Newton, consult all the greatest physicists, and we shall find them all, without ex' 
ception, asserting that the progress of physical science has not, and cannot, help us 
to discover a single natural cause. We are ever, through the advance of science, 
learning more and more of the facts of nature, —facts whose uniformity gives 
them the name of laws, facts linked together in time and circiunstances, but always 
facts. Physical science, by its hnmense strides, has succeeded in destroying utterly 
all the supposed natural causes, none of these causes having been verified or strictly 



246 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

SO to speak, ugaiust the nature of things, he will choose 
between the things which are pleasant or painful, or between 
those which are more or less pleasant ; but no nionil motive 
enters here : he feels himself indebted to nature only for its 
goodness and beaut}^ and this goodness and beauty are, 
in fact, the measure of his love and admiration, as his love 
and admiration are the measure and the rule of his conduct. 

But, as soon as he learns through language to know the 
will of an intelligent being, his mother or nurse, he begins 
to bow before it, and to conform himself to it, with the sense 
of being bound to do so ; as recognizing that this intelligent 
being is worthy of his affection, and deserves it the more 
for being the first to give him love and service.^ 

This state of mind belongs to the third order of cognitions. 
Later on, it happens at times that the child finds the known 
will of the loved person (the Avill that has become to him 
a positive law) in conflict with some of his inclinations, and 
with the satisfaction of his wants. This is the beginning 
of moral struggle within him, and creates a new state of 
mind. Let us mark well the moral nature of this struggle. 
While his judgment of things around him was guided solely 
by their pleasantness and beauty, or their unpleasantness 
and deformity, he had only to arrange them in the order of 

proved: they are all and always simply assumed. Hence the ignorance of physics, 
in times past, could lead to imagining causes in nature, and from these, as from 
so many demonstrated truths, to explaining the events in the world. But the rigor- 
ous logic of modern science, having shown that all these supposed causes are mere 
hypotheses, has made a clean sweep of them, and cleared the ground, leaving open 
the door for supernatural causes. It follows that Strauss exhibits the grossest 
ignorance of the state of modern physics and its true results, and stands little 
better, as regards logic, when he tells us that "we know now how to explam by 
natural causes the events which occur in the world and in humanity." And yet 
his Biblical doctrine, — let us say, with his countrymen, his impiety, — rests entirely 
on this fine foundation. 

1 It has been observed that the affectation of affection has no influence with 
children, who have a fine perception of the true or false in sentinient. " Eien 
n'egale," says Mme. Necker, " la froidexir des en/ants ])our les demonstrations 
hypocrites." L. II,, c. ii, 



EXTERNAL WILL IN EDUCATION. 247 

his affections, giving tlie highest place to the first, the lowest 
to the second, and an intermediate one to others. He 
exercised his moral feeling by distributing his benevolence 
and admiration according to the merits of things. He 
might, indeed, as we said before, be led into an unfair 
distribution through the traps laid for his judgment by the 
deceitfulness of the people about him ; but the false opinions 
so formed, which governed his estimates, could not excite his 
remorse, because they were formed on appearances which 
he held to be true, and on the word of persons whom he 
thought himself bound to trust. 

But, when he comes to know the will of another person, 
a new element finds entrance into his mind which must 
necessarily disturb it. The will of a person is something 
opposed to the nature of things : in nature there is necessity ; 
in will all is free and contingent : nature is constant, immu- 
table ; will continually changes : the various parts of nature, 
the various beings which compose it, follow a fixed order 
which seems to leave no place for free will. It is a new 
thing, which has no homogeneity, no resemblance with these 
things. The exigencies of things are always the same, but 
the will of another person requires sometimes more, some- 
times less ; sometimes demands one thing, sometimes the 
contrary ; is sometimes directed to what is easy and pleasant, 
sometimes to what is hard and painful. If, then, the child 
is inclined partly to conform himself to the will of an- 
other, partly (as we shall see) to make the latter bend to his, 
he finds himself at once in a condition of severe struggle, 
and called upon either to subordinate the subjective-objective 
order of natural existences,^ or to dissent from the will of 
the persons who rule him. What is the effect on the child 
of this grave discordance ? How will he resolve this moral 

1 I call it subjective-objective , because, as we have seen, the child forms his 
estimate of things from the impressions they make upon him ; but this very impres- 
sion gives it objectivity. 



248 THE RULING PEINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

conflict, the conflict of two duties striving for the govern- 
ment of his will? 

327. In the first place, if his animal activity determines 
him irresistibly and instantly to action, it may very well 
happen that he will forget the will of the person whom he 
knows he ought to love and respect, and afterwards that he 
will quietly forget all that is past. But, if that will is present 
to his mind, and he chooses to disobey it, he cannot do so 
without pain ; and this proves that he sets obedience to it 
above all his other duties, and considers it as his first law. 
This pain or incipient remorse is the source of his moral 
conscience. Conscience is born in the hour when the child 
knows he has disobeyed that beloved will ; that he has 
sinned against it ; that he has preferred to it other things 
which should have come after it, but which seduced him from 
his allegiance. In the words of one herself a mother : 
"Good to him means pleasing those he loves; evil, being 
blamed by theni.^ The poor child knows no better ; even 
if he has done nothing wrong, he believes himself guilty, 
if he sees displeasure in his mother's countenance ; and if 
he has chanced to give her real pain, to strike her in a fit 
of impatience, his repentance amounts almost to despair. 
I remember seeing a little child, in such a case, who, without 
being either scolded or threatened, gave up all his toys and 
went sobbing bitterly to hide himself in a dark corner of 
the room with his face to the wall. Although capricious 
and changeable, this feeling is the dawn of conscience."^ 

1 I do not think that the idea of Maine or jrraise enters iiito the first exhorta- 
tions of conscience, but only that of being in unison with, or in opposition to, the 
will of the beloved one. This is, in fact, the moral obligation of the third order of 
cognitions, which, expressed in a general and imperative formula (certainly not 
known to the child), would run thus : " Man is bound to act in accordance with 
his fellow-men "; or, " The wills of the several men should be in agi-eement." It is 
the substance of this great moral prhiciple which is so splendidly manifested in 
the child through his natural benevolence ; and the greater his benevolence, the 
more I'esplendent it is. 

2 Mad. Necker de Saussuie, L. III. c. ii. 



AWAKENING OF CONSCIENCE. 249 

The morality, then, of the fourth order shows itself in 
conscience ; but it would be a mistake to suppose that this 
morality can be fitly expressed by the formula : Obey thy 
conscience. Conscience is not yet a rule of action, but 
only a consciousness of doing, or of having done, wrong 
— nothing more. 

328. The formulas, then, of the fourth order of cognition 
(not that such formulas are expressed at this stage, but 
then* contents are there, and are formulated later on), or, 
let us say, the moral principles of the fourth order, are 
the following : 

First. The harmony of our own will with that of other in- 
telligent beings should be set above all other satisfactions. 

Second. If there is a conflict between them, ever}^ other 
satisfaction should be sacrificed to keep our own will in 
harmony with that of others.^ 

Both these principles contain a great advance made by 
the child in the field of morality. 

The first is remarkable for the noble feeling by which we 
recognize that our highest good must be the accordance 
of our will w4th the will of others, to which every other good 
must be subordinate. The second is also most remarkable, 
as introducing the element of sacrifice into the moral order, 
and the virtue of fortitude necessary to accomplish it. We 
shall necessarily retm'n more than once to the momentous 

2 I do not say here " with the will of the mother," but, " with that of others," 
because the special affection which binds the child to his mother is a i)urely acci- 
dental thing, drawn from the treasure of his heart, in which lies the inclination to 
universal benevolence. In order to draw out this benevolence, and bring it to bear 
on particular objects, the latter must be known as good and intelligent beings, and 
the mother has the opportunity of revealing herself as such to the child. The 
latter, who is ignorant that he owes his being to her, cannot love her in virtue of 
her maternity, but solely as the good and intelligent being in whose hands he is, 
whom he knows, and whose loving-kindness he feels. He would attach himself in 
the same way to any other woman. The child, then, is conscious of the duty of 
conforming his will to that of others, when he feels that will to be good, and it is 
only by accident that he applies and directs this principle to special persons. 



250 ON THE EULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

consequences which must follow, in the moral world of the 
child, from two such grave and exalted principles. 

Section 3. — Tdea of God. 

329. An Absolute Being comes already to be known as 
necessary in the second order of cognitions (nos. 181-182). 

To the baptized, according to the profound doctrine of 
Christianity, is given, moreover, the feeling of this Abso- 
lute Being, the perception or positive knowledge of Him 
(no. 137). 

Let us first consider the progress of our natural knowl- 
edge of God : we will add afterwards that which belongs 
to supernatural communication. 

Natural knowledge of God is always negative and ideal, ^ 
because man does not perceive God in it, but only reasons 
through induction, that, beyond all finite things, there must 
be something infinite^ although what that infinite may be 
he knows not.^ Now, such cognition as this, simple as it is, 
is y^t susceptible of successive increase. We have to show 
what this increase is, by seeking the form in which such a 
cognition is found at the fifth period of childhood, or the 
fourth stage of his intelligence, at which we have now 
arrived. 

When the child first perceives a real entity, the mother 
must not imagine that he sees any limits to it : for him that 
first being is the only one, the all of being. He does not, 

1 I have already spoken of tlie nature of this knowledge in the New Essay, 
nos. 1085 and foil., where I have shown that ideality is the principle of being 
and reality its term ; so that, whenever we know a being through its ideality only, 
we have solely that knowledge of it which I have termed ideal negative cognition; 
and when we know it through our perception of its reality, we have what I 
have termed imsitive cognition of it. 

2 The mhid makes this induction in virtue of the integrating faculty of the 
understanding, which I have already shown to be the source of negative ideas. 
New Essay (no. 1454 n.) and nos. 181 and foil, of this work. 



CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE INFINITE. 251 

indeed, feel that all, but be supposes it, or, at all events, 
does not deny it, in the entity perceived.^ 

Yet his sense is limited : all that he sees and feels is 
surrounded with limitations. The division, the multiplicity 
of beings, are there to contradict his thoughts and to tell 
him that he errs, if he believes them to be the all of being. 
His mother's words finally undeceive him. Not only do 
they more and more divide, and, as it were, break up in his 
thought the being of things, but with the solemn word God^ 
which he hears pronounced, he finally comes to the convic- 
tion that there is an all of being, and that it is none of the 
things which have yet appeared to him. Tliis is the first 
conception of a God distinct from nature that is formed 
in the infant mind. 

In this conception, the child certainly does not remain 
in the ideal : he affirms a reality ; but this reality has not 
been perceived by him ; he knows not what it is, but only 
that it fully answers to the universal ideal illuminating his 



1 Some of the German philosophers have had glimpses of this truth, that the 
finite in the mind of man demands the infinite. But, 1st, they started from the 
subject, from the /, as the primary perception, whereas experience, on which our 
theory is founded, shows that the / is perceived rather late, and long after man has 
perceived external things ; 2d, starting from the perception of the /, and assum- 
ing that it cannot take place without the perception, at the same time, of the 
world and of God, they are unable to give a reason for this triple perception, 
which remains in their system an isolated, inexplicable fact ; 3d, to say that the 
perception of the finite involves that of the infinite, is a proposition which, if 
given as a primary fact, is inexplicable, and which can have no other rational 
ground than the universality of the idea of beiny illuminating the mind. If this 
is admitted, it follows that the supposed triple perception of our philosophers is 
falsely assumed to be the first human cognition. 4th and lastly, the doctrine of 
a triple perception has the very grave defect of not distinguishing between posi- 
tive cognition, which is perception , Vin({ negative cognition, which is not perception, 
but a simple indicative act of intelligence. We, on the contrary, assert that the 
infant, with its first perception of the limited being of its mother, believes and 
affirms in its mind (Init does not yet perceive) the subsistence of a something to 
which it sets no limits : it does not go from the finite to the infinite ; but while its 
senses rest on the finite, its mind goes forth into the infinite. — See Neio Essay, 
nos. 1429 and foil. 



252 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OE METHOD. 

mind. A conception of tliis kind is so simple that it admits 
of no analysis, so long as it retains this form ; but it very 
soon advances and develops, and this is the manner of its 
development : — 

330. The child perceives nothing of the divine reality ; 
hence perception cannot complete his knowledge of God, or 
give him the material for that process of analysis and syn- 
thesis by which the human mind attains its knowledge of 
natural things. Its progress in this knowledge does, never- 
theless, indirectly assist the conception of the divine, for 
this reason, that the more we learn to know of natural and 
finite being, the more we know of universal being, and thus 
in some manner ascend to the cognition of the Absolute 
by the constant removal of limitations. The Absolute and 
relative, in fact, are necessarily connected, and, therefore, 
the more we know of relative being, the more we know of 
its relation to the Absolute, and we may form a cognition 
of the latter consisting precisely of those relations. It is 
true that, if I remove all limits to the perfections I see in 
created beings, say to power, wisdom, goodness, I know 
nothing of what they thus become. I have not the faintest 
idea of what these unlimited perfections will be transformed 
into ; but, be their unknown transformation what it ma}^, 
I yet know this, that I shall have lost nothing of them, 
that I shall still possess all the good of them inexpressibly, 
inconceivably increased, and this is already a large addi- 
tion to my knowledge, although it consists entirely in the 
relations of an unknown thing to the known, without any 
further perception or feeling of that unknown than I had 
before. 

The child, at the second stage of cognition, learns to 
speak : at the third, the name of God, sounded in liis ears, 
makes him aware, not only of His existence, as distinct from 
that of nature, but he places in God himself the intelligence 



IDEA OF GOD, HOW REACHED. 253 

and goodness he has begun to recognize in his mother — an 
absohite goodness and intelligence, to which he already gives 
infinite admiration and affection, soon changed into adora- 
tion, if he is aided by religious instruction. 

We have already seen how the child, directed by his intel- 
ligent nature, feels intimately the respect which is due to the 
will of others, and the superiority of that intelligent will to 
all other things, feels that he ought, therefore, to give up all 
others, rather than place himself in disaccord with it. Un- 
doubtedly, the feeling thus shown by the child towards the 
will of his mother, or of others dear to him, is greatly helped 
and strengthened by his ignorance, as yet, of the limitations 
of that will, and the greater dignity which he attributes to 
it beyond what it really has ; and he is prompted to this by 
his contemplation of universal being, with whose greatness he 
believes at first the real things he perceives to correspond. 
But, in every way the Divine will fully satisfies tlie want he 
feels of an absolute, complete, and universal will, and, there- 
fore, he is entirely disposed to conform to it ; and, as soon as 
he can understand what it means, he will accept it as so 
natural, just, and necessary, that it will never occur to him 
to ask a reason why. Rather, he will show eagerness to 
know what is the will of God, even in the most minute things, 
if only the natural religion in his heart has been duly cher- 
ished and cultivated. Thus, at this early age, the child's 
mind is inclined, even by nature, to recognize God as the 
supreme legislator. 

331. Christianity unveils to us a mystery : it assures us 
that the soul of the child undergoes, through baptism, a secret 
but most powerful action, which raises it to the supernatural 
order, and places it in communication with God.^ The 
effect of this, as we have already pointed out, is an intimate 
feeling of the reality of God. This, as it were, colors and 

1 See note of Translator to n. 137. 



254 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

incarnates the natural cognition of God, making it positive, 
hastening its progress, giving it the life by which it becomes 
a spring of action in man, and bears fruit in the most sub- 
lime moral development. 

Christian parents should exult in this divine treasure hid- 
den in the souls of their children, and adore, preserve, and 
develop it ; finally, they ought not only to gain help by the 
grace of tlie sacraments, but also by that which they may 
obtain for their child through offering him to the Highest, 
praying for him, using the sacred offices (sacramentaU) , to 
which is attached a beneficent virtue, through the power of 
the Church of Jesus Christ. 

The development of grace is worked out through virtue 
and knowledge. As regards virtue, it is the love which should 
be sown and cultivated from the first in the infant soul. As 
regards knowledge, it is the knowledge of Christ which an- 
swers to the infusion of baptismal grace, and is acquired 
through the word of God himself. The cliild at that age 
should learn to know Christ, not only as God made man, 
but as the Master of men, having a will to which all must 
submit their wills : this is the time when the Gospel can be 
opened up to the youthful intelligence. 

CHAPTER H. 

THE ACTIVE FACULTIES OF THE FOURTH ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 

332. We pass from the intellectual development of the 
fourth order to the human activity which corresponds to it. 
To treat this question fully, we shpuld speak separately of 
the rational and the animal activity of tlie child ; but this 
would take us too far, without any immediate advantage to 
our present purpose. We shall, then, as in previous sections, 
select for consideration only the salient points, as it were, of 
the child's activity, the characteristic marks and traits which 
should be specially observed by the educator. 



APPRECIATIVE VOLITIONS. 



255 



ARTICLE I. 

WITH THE FOURTH ORDER BEGIN APPRECIATIVE VOLITIONS. 

333. Appreciative volitions are those which arise from 
the comparison of two objects, whether good or bad, of 
which we value one more or less than the other. 

We have already seen that comparison begins only in the 
fourth order (nos. 302, 303) ; therefore, only at that stage 
can the will perform the act by which we choose between 
two things compared together. 

It is, indeed, possible in the preceding order, i. e., the 
third, to prize objects ; for that does not involve a com- 
parison, but not to appreciate them, which requires a pref- 
erence and antecedent comparison. 



Acts of the Intellect. 


Corresponding Acts of Will. 


First 
Order. 


Perception of subsistence. 


Affective volition, having for its term 
the whole of subsisting being. 


Second 
Order. 


Abstraction of the sensible 
qualities which awaken 
interest. 


Affective volition, having for its terai 
solely the sensible quality, good or 
bad (abstracted, that is, exactly marked 
off from the other indifferent qualities 
of the entity). 


Third 
Order. 


Judgments concerning the 
qualities of objects, or 
synthesis, by which it is 
affirmed that a given in- 
teresting quality exists in 
a given subject. 


Prizing volition, having for its term the 
object in so far as the mind recognizes 
in it the interesting quality, and thus 
estimates it. 


Fourth 
Order. 


Comparison of two objects 
judged of, by which a 
third judgment is made, 
giving the preference to 
one over the other — ap- 
preciation. 


A2yi)reciativey6\\tion, preference, choice 
between two objects. 



256 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

If we consider that, in the second order, abstractions are 
formed, and thus become the objects of desire, while in the 
first order only existences are perceived, which alone, there- 
fore, can be desired, it will be easy to establish and mark out 
the corresponding progress of the will in those four orders, 
as shown in the preceding table. 

ARTICLE II. 

FREEDOM. 

334. The exercise of appreciative volition would not alone 
suffice to prove the child to be in possession of his free will. 
I have already shown that, if the appreciation and conse- 
quent choice regard the material order of things, or even 
purely intellectual objects, there may be choice, and yet not 
freedom. The latter begins to manifest itself on the first 
occasion on which man is called upon to compare the moral 
order with the inferior orders of things, and for the first 
time to choose between his duty and his pleasure, or the 
Satisfaction of some casual instinct. (See Anthrop>ology ^ 
nos. 543-566.) 

But this first act takes place precisely at the fourth order 
of cognitions. The collision between the things which at- 
tract him and his sense of duty, occurs in the child as soon 
as he becomes aware of a p)ositive ivill in opposition to his 
natural inclinations. Now, the knowledge of this will comes 
to him in the fourth order. We have seen how high he holds 
it ; how he feels that it is something far above all other 
things, and how the respect which he is disposed to pay to 
the will of a Being that knows and is known to him, is so 
great that, if for any motive, under the influence of tempta- 
tion, he prefers to it any other good whatsoever, he feels 
bitter remorse, and cannot live without returning to peace 
and concord with that will. 

From want of observing tliis tendency of the child's na- 



FORCE AND MORAL SUASION. 257 

ture, Rousseau was led iuto a miserable and unworthy 
judgment of human nature, maintaining that, at first, 
foZe, and not moral means, should be employed to control 
it, — the idea of duty being too far above the infant's capa- 
city. How entirely is this system belied by facts ! How 
utterly has the presumption of sophists dehumanized hu- 
manity ! It is time that the present age should reconquer, 
step by step, the dignity which has been lost, and this it is 
doing from day to day, by the victorious power given to the 
truth through accurate observation of the facts of human 
nature. It is such impartial observation that reveals to us 
in the child this wonderful and comforting truth, that he 
obeys moral duty sooner than he obeys force; he obeys 
the former before he has learned to know the latter. 
Once more, let us look at this matter through the wise 
and clear-sighted eyes of a mother, who read accurately 
her children's minds, and observed and understood them 

thoroughly. 

" More attentive observation," says Mme. Guizot, speak- 
ing of Rousseau, " would have taught him that moral neces- 
sity, i. e., duty, which is a portion of our nature, born with 
us, is felt by"^ children long before physical necessity, the 
knowledge of which comes from without, through a variety 
of experiences and of comparisons, impossible for the child 
till long after a natural instinct has made him feel the moral 
necessity of obedience. There is not a nurse who does not 
know tliat the way to make a child resist is to try to take 
from him by force what he holds in his hand, whereas a 
sign with which he is already familiar is sometimes enough 
to make him let it go ; and if he still resists, he is strug- 
gling, though feebly, against the pricks of his own convic- 
tionl his hesitation is seen in his countenance ; he seems to 
be looking for a^essation of the will which displeases him, 
and thus to be restored to freedom. But when, at last, it is 



258 ON THE EULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

more strongly pronounced ; when, in order to make him obey, 
an expression of displeasure has been added to that of will, 
he yields with a look of discomposure which is neither 
anger nor fear, but the disturbing sense of a fault. The 
small features contract, but not violently ;' he looks at you ; 
he is not yet crying : his whole being is hanging in suspense 
between the tears ready to start and the expectation of the 
inward smile which may quickly return and bring back 
brightness to the poor little face, scarcely yet formed, and 
yet sufficient to reveal a soul." ^ 

The child, then, when it has arrived at this stage of 
intelligence, chooses between good and evil, — enters into 
possession of his freedom. 

335. From this first appearance of free action we must 
infer a certain degree of moral strength with which the 
human being, who takes the side of moral goodness, re- 
sists and overcomes the opposing temptations. This moral 
strength, which we have termed practical force ^ at first shows 
itself only by snatches, and often gives way when the trial is 
severe ; but its strength increases, or else finds help and 
support on which to rest, thereby testifying to a capacity 
for progress, and to a certain development in the mind of 
the child. 

ARTICLE ni, 

HOW BELIEF AND DOCILITY NATURALLY INCREASE IN THE CHILD. 

336. If the belief and docility of the child were always 
fostered by false and unreasonable teaching, or teaching the 
reason of which he is incapable of understanding, his bud- 
ding virtue might easily be suppressed in the cradle. An 
inward conflict of the saddest and most painful kind would 
arise in his mind. That external will which had appeared 
to him as something divine, worthy of infinite reverence, 
would be changed into something mysterious, inexplicable, 

1 Lett. vui. 



BELIEF AND DOCILITY. 259 

of inconceivable malignity. Utterly confused from the first, 
not knowing whether to listen to the voice of nature reveal- 
ing to him, in the first will he feels, a supreme digmt}^ or, to 
his own experience, which shows it to be blind and lawless, 
he would be led to moral hopelessness and the depravation 
of his own feelings. Providence, however, has not per- 
mitted that those to whom the bringing up of children is 
intrusted should be wholly bad or wholly um-easonable. 
Whatever in them is orderly, reasonable, kind, forms the 
beneficent element which strengthens in the child those two 
earliest seeds of virtue deposited in him b}^ nature, — I mean 
belief and docility. 

The child becomes more respectful to those in charge of 
him, trusts them more, is more inclined to obedience, the 
more he can see the truth and the use of what he is told or 
commanded. 

The best educator will, then, be he who best knows how to 
strengthen in his pupil the habits of belief and docility, 
whose words, narratives, and commands have most of the 
truths which can be understood by the child, and from which 
he can draw inferences, and most of the utility which he can 
observe and try for himself. 

337. In fact, when the child has formed a belief which ne 
finds to be true, and has drawn inferences from it, he becomes 
more docile, and is anxious to learn more from his teachers ; 
for he has found that he owes all he knows to having be- 
lieved them in the first instance. This fact has been already 
noted: "As his (the child's) knowledge is based on the 
teaching he has received, from the moment he becomes in- 
terested in what he has learned, he feels also the need of 
believing what he is taught, and finds in the belief already 
accepted the foundation of new ones. We believe because we 
have believed, and because the authority to which we have 
3ielded our belief appears to us to have the same right to 



260 ON THE KULING PKINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

the same belief each tmie that what it proposes to us to 
believe is not more incredible than that of which it has 
already persuaded us ; and, without examining the motive 
of our previous adhesion, we make the latter the motive of 
our subsequent one."^ 

ARTICLE IV. 

THE DESIRE TO INFLUENCE OTHERS. 

338. Not even the wise adaptation of lessons and com- 
mands, or the child's tendency to belief, strengthened by 
love of the knowledge gained through it and the sense of 
advantages derived from docility, can, however, prevent the 
will of the teacher from frequently comii*g into perilous 
collision with the lower propensities of the child. 

At first, when the child finds himself in this painful conflict, 
and, yet clings to what he feels to be his duty, namely, ad- 
herence to the will of others at any sacrifice, so long as that 
will is present to his mind, he cannot resist it without the 
bitterest remorse. But, when the strength of the temptation 
and the attraction of the forl^idden thing take away his 
attention entirely from the will which is his law, and, as it 
were, hide it from him for the time, so that he can no longer 
see it, he is easily drawn away, and then his fall is certain. 
That moment of darkness may be instantaneous only, and 
is often followed almost immediately Ijy the returning per- 
ception of the law, and by the remorse which he tries, in 
vain, to hide and suppress. 

The child, however, does his utmost to gratify his desire, 
and 3^et avoid the terrible misfortune of acting against the 
will of others. Hence, while at first he inclines to conform 
his own will to theirs, later on, when passion wakes up, and 
the internal conflict begins, he strives to win over their will 
to his, seeking in one way or another to preserve the unity 

1 Mad. Guizot, Lett. IX. 



FOURTH ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 261 

of the two, which he shrinlvs from destroying, however 
strongly tempted to do so. 

This, then, is the age at which children begin to manifest 
the intense desire they have to influence the will of others, 
to gratify which they early display such marvellous dexterity, 
such wonderful quickness and penetration.^ 

CHAPTER III. 

INSTRUCTION ADAPTED TO THE FOURTH ORDER OF COGNITIONS. 

ARTICLE I. 

HOW LANGUAGE SHOULD BE THE FOUNDATION OF ALL INSTRUCTION OF 

THE YOUNG. 

339. In speaking, now, of the instruction adapted to the 
fourth order of cognitions, I shall not repeat what I have 
said in treating of the other orders, much of which applies 
also to this and the following ones. I shall rather, follow- 
ing the same method as heretofore, touch, in connection with 
this order, on certain principles of teaching, which should be 
borne in mind through each of the succeeding ones. It is 
in this order that their necessity first makes itself felt, 
although it becomes more and more apparent in those that 
follow. 

One of the fundamental principles which should govern 
the instruction given from first to last, is to consider lan- 
guage as the universal instrument provided by nature for the 
intellectual development of man, and, therefore, to make the 
most careful effort to make sure that this noble instrument 
shall fulfil its purpose ; that words and thoughts shall be 
accurately connected ; that man, in short, shall become more 
and more versed in language, but so that his progress in that 
shall also be a true progress in ideas and in knowledge. 

1 To sum up : To the first order of cognitions corresponds benevolence towards 
the person known ; to the second, benevolence towards the will of that person, 
made known through speech ; to the third, the conforming of the will to that of 
others ; to the fourth, the endeavor to bend that of others to the child's own. 



262 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

This great principle was known to antiquity ; it has been 
proclaimed in modern times, and in our Italy ; but it has not 
yet been reduced to practice with the care and perseverance 
which it deserves. 

One of those who, in our own country, has best understood 
its importance, Taverna, advocating it in an address he 
delivered in Piacenza, affirms justly that "words have no 
authority and no office, if we divide them from things, nor 
can things have the light thrown on them by which the 
mind distinguishes, orders, and groups them, and acquires 
the power to recall them, if they are detached and set apart 
from words." Further on, he adds: "This individual con- 
junction of the thoughts, affections, and actions of man, and 
of every natural object with language, was truly felt by 
those early sages, who, knowing that the language of a 
people includes within itself all the elements of their knowl- 
edge, judged that to teach it to children was to lay down 
in their minds and engrave there a universal basis of 
knowledge."^ 

340. We have seen that the infant, prior to gaining the 
power of speech, is tied down to subsisting things. He 
cannot detach himself from them in thought, and take his 
flight through the vast regions of abstraction. The deeper 
we penetrate into this matter, the more do we find that all 
our intellectual errors, all the pernicious theories, the decep- 
tive sophistries b}^ which individuals and nations have been 

1 Prolusione alle Lezioni di Storia recitate in Piacenza, il 15 Febbrieo 1811, 
nella sala del Collegio di S. Pietro. — Operette of Taverna, collected by Sllvestri, 
Milan, 1830. Taverna returned to the same point in various places of tliose pre- 
cious Operette, in one of which he says: "Looking more deeply into this matter, 
I will really that, the child having the desire to discern and divide things, and to 
mark them with a sign, these single words are exactly adapted to his use. There- 
fore, he never ceases to ask how this or that thing is called, because, until he has 
the name, he seems to himself to know nothing, but with it to know everything ; 
and so he goes on inquiring as if he would scour for himself all the realms of 
nature. In teaching words to children, then, we are meeting their own wishes." 
{Prime Leiture, Dedica.) 



INSTRUCTION IN LANGUAGE. 263 

deluded, can be traced to the vague and improper use of 
words. By a thorough knowledge of language, then, the 
child can be taught propriety of speech, not for ornament, 
but for accuracy, truth, and utility ; and this is the best 
means of preserving him from being dazzled or deceived 
by illusions, and making him a man of exquisite dis- 
cernment and acute logical faculty, with accurate, well- 
grounded knowledge. If we look at this matter in all its 
bearings, it will be seen that this is no exaggeration of its 
importance. 

But, unfortunately, the necessary books for our purpose do 
not yet exist : we do not yet possess a vocabulary contain- 
ing the larger propriety of words, which would necessarily 
be in a certain way an encyclopedia of knowledge. I say 
the larger propriety^ because there is a lesser one, that of 
dialects and of short, rather than long, periods of time. 
The larger propriety I speak of is more constant ; it is not 
the work of a small population, or of passing custom, but 
of national, and sometimes universal, human usage, lasting 
through centuries, and often surviving by many centuries, in 
the living roots of words, the languages which have them- 
selves perished.^ 

ARTICLE II. 

EXERCISE OF EXTERNAL ACTIVITY, OF IMAGINATION, MEMORY, AND THE 

AFFECTIONS. 

341. The exercises of external activity, according to the 
rules we have given (no. 290) , should be continued in the 
fourth and following orders, and also the teaching by pictures 

1 The celebrated saying of Horace {De Arte Poet, 72), which attributes to usage 
t'ae choice, tlie reason, and the form of expression, is undoubtedly true; but in 
how many different ways may we not imderstand it? — I should wish, therefore, 
to add to it, that usage has the greater authority the more ancient it is, and the 
larger the number, whether of persons or peoples, that have sanctioned it ; also, that 
the usage of a day should not i)revail over that of centuries, and that the words of 
ancient origin, though they may have little currency at the moment, yet belong to 
usage, rather than those which are coined from day to day, and from day to day 
modified and given up. The former constitutes the larger, and fashion the lesser, 
propriety of language. 



264 ON THE RULING PKINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

and representations of things. It would be a great work, 
worthy of a philosopher and a philanthropist, to form a col- 
lection of pictorial and dramatic representations adapted 
to the gradual development of the infant mind. 

The exercises to which we have given the name of oral 
should also be continued, and to them should be added 
exercises of memory. The latter may begin with short 
moral precepts, expressing only the morality proportioned 
to the child's understanding, i. e., that which contains no 
moral formulas above the order of cognitions to which he 
has attained, or at most only those of the order immediately 
above. A collection of such precepts duly arranged according 
to the grades of cognitions, which should constitute so many 
grades of instruction, is also a much needed and necessary 
work. A similarly arranged collection of poetry would be 
equally useful in exercising the memory of children. 

342. The help of music should not be sought as a mere 
pleasure to the sense. The child himself, frivolous as he 
seems, and swayed by his sensations, requires more than 
that. He is intelligent, and seeks first intelligence in all 
things, even in his sensations, and afterwards emotion and 
delight of the purest kind which spring from them. For 
this reason, I firmly believe that music could be made a 
most useful instrument of education, if applied by the 
teacher to touch with emotion those moral precepts and 
moral representations which the child already knows and 
understands. In this way music, instead of being meaning- 
less or predominating over thought, would become the hand- 
maid of language already communicated to him, and he 
would listen to it, as to a sweet and tender interpreter of 
the noblest conceptions his soul has yet attained, but 
which hitherto have lain there without life or color. 

But who shall find such music as that ? Who shall use it 
with the sobriety, the self-sacrificing courage, to put into it 



USE OF MUSIC. 265 

neither the beauty which is purely sensual, nor the beauty 
above the child's comprehension? Who shall understand 
and value nuisic expressing only childish tlioiights, clothed 
in childish words? What security have 1, that even these 
suggestions of mine may not be misunderstood, and that the 
attempt to put them in practice may not lead to abuse ?^ 

AKTICLE III. 

ORAL EXERCISES IN THIS PERIOD. 

343. Oral exercises should be continued in this period 
as a sort of prelude to the teaching of reading and writing, 
being made more and more an exercise of intelligence. 

As, in the preceding period, the exercises turned upon 
nouns and verbs, they should now introduce particles, or the 
connection of nouns with each other, of verbs with each 
other, and of nouns with verbs. This is, in fact, teach- 
ing to speak, if properl}^ done. There are ideas and 
thoughts which, although within the reach of the childish 
understanding, the child finds extreme difficulty in express- 
ing. ^Xe must first point out to him the thought to be 
expressed, and then lead him to find the most fitting and 
effectual way of giving it utterance. 

But, for the success of these exercises a book is wanted, 
in which some expert should collect a number of thoughts 
adapted to each order of cognitions, and also the fitting 
mode of expressing them. With such a book, it would be 
easy to lead the child gradually from the thoughts and the 

1 N'ote of Translator. — All that Rosmini mentions in this article, as desid- 
erata, has been long since supplied, with more or less success, by the infant 
school system, and far more efficiently by Froebel's Kindergarten system, every 
part of which is directed to the gradual development of the child's whole 
nature. Froebel's Mutter- unci Kosc-Lieder, of which more than one translation 
has been made into English, are the complete realization of Rosmini's ideal of 
music for children, while his games and story-telling supply the active dramatic 
element which Rosmini, with the same deep insight into child-nature, wished to 
add to the passive element of pictorial representation. 



266 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

mode of expression proper to a lower order of cognition 
to those proper to the higher orders. I include expression 
as well as thought, for the same thought may be variously 
expressed, and yet always fitly, — adapted, that is, to one 
order of cognitions, and not to another. 

Certain constructions are difficult for children, and why? 
Because they belong to an order of ideas which is beyond 
them. The wise man who should compose the book we 
want, would thus have to classify according to age the 
constructions and different forms of expression, and the 
child would have to be taught from these by degrees.^ 

How greatly w^ould the child's power of expressing him- 
self properly be thus increased ! How would the facility of 
thinking increase with his skill in the use of language, the 
universal means of intellectual development ! How much 
time would be saved in school ! With what ease will the 
child later on write down his thoughts who has learned to 
speak them in appropriate and fitting words ! 

ARTICLE IV. 

INSTRUCTION IN BEADING AND WRITING. 

344. At this period should also begin the teaching to read 
and write. 

1 The language of children is full of ellipses. Mad. de Saussure has well 
observed this. " Ainsi, je suppose,'' she says, " qu'on dise a I'enfant, en lui tend- 
ant la main : ' Voiilez-vous venir au jardin avec moi ? ' II repetera, ' Qui, oui, 
venir au jardin avec moi!' le geste et le mot de jardin ayant sufli a son intelli- 
gence. Si au contraire on lui disait en faisant signe de le repousser : ' J'irai au 
jardin sans vous,' il repeterait long-temps en se lamentant : pas sans vous, pas 
sans vous.' On voit par la que tout en comprenant fort bien la phrase entiere, 
il n'attribxie pas un sens a chaque mot." (Liv. II. c. vi.) The peoples of an- 
tiquity, who always exhibit the phenomena of childhood, are also full of ellipses 
and reticences. (See further observations in the Storia Comparativa e Critica de" 
Sistemi morali, Cap. V. Ai-t. vii.) Now, the exercises we are proposing should 
serve, be it remembered, to make the child express distinctly all the ideas in a 
sentence, even those which, in his natural language, he would leave unuttered, 
and this is their principal advantage. But the expression of the ideas should 
still be his own, that is, on the same level as his understanding. 



INSTRUCTION IN READING AND WRITING. 267 

Uttered words, languages, are the signs of ideas ; written 
words, writing, are tlie signs of words. ^ 

Writing thus belongs to the order of cognitions next above 
that of language, which is the third. But we have observed 
that language itself embraces more than one order in its 
various parts, and that verbs, which are among the most 
important, are not understood before the third order is 
reached. The child must tlien be allowed time to get a 
sufficient understanding of the words spoken, and I should 
advise deferring teaching him to read till he is well ad- 
vanced in the fourth intellectual order, which generally 
corresponds with the second half of the third year. 

This interval, before we begin to teach him his letters, may 
be most usefully employed in the oral exercises which will 
make him perfect in the mechanism of pronunciation, give 
him a larger vocabulary, and, above all, make him exercise 
his understanding, after which he will begin learning to read 
and write fully prepared and capable of rapid progress. 

Nevertheless, this learning to read and write which, as we 
have seen, should alwa3^s go together, should not be hurried 
on, but should rather proceed slowly, seeing that our object, 
which should never be lost sight of, is not to teach reading 
and writing alone, but, with these, many other things much 
higher and more important. It should be remembered, also, 
that no teaching should be simply mechanical, but that it 
should always tend to exercise all the child's faculties and 
to be a moral training besides. These principles have been 
loudly proclaimed in Italy by men who are an honor to her, 
for their goodness of heart and elevation of mind.^ 

1 It is evident that we are speaking here of the mechanical process of writing. 
The writing which is the immediate sign of thought should rather be called 
language than writing. 

2 The Abbe Taverna defends as follows the method he prescribes of detaining 
children a long time over the study of words : " They (the children thus taught) 
are acquainted with very few of the relations existing between the many objects 



268 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

I think that reacliug and writing may most conveniently 
be tauglit together, or alternately, as two parts of the 
same study, rather than as two separate studies. Both 
belong, in fact, to the same order of cognitions ; for to 
write is only to add the action of the hand to draw the 
characters which, being already known, require no fresh 

they observe ; but they have in their hands the instrument and the method 
whereby to discover them — I mean language; because care has been tal^en not 
to lay on their memory an idea without the word proper to it, and the same 
care has been used not to teach them words to which they cannot attach the 
corresponding idea, and the construction of language is directed to express by 
signs the i*elations which exist between ideas, and, therefore, between the things 
which awaken ideas. In this way they will acquire the habit of neither uttering 
nor hearing words without knowing or inquiring their meaning ; they will 
accept only such ideas as they find included in ik*se they already possess, or 
in the new objects offered to their senses. Their ignorance will appear very 
great; but be proud of it, all you enlightened teachers; for equally great is already 
their desire for knowledge. This is the ignorance in which nature long detains 
us for our good. The pupils of pedants will have more words, but have less 
knowledge, and will find, perhaps, insuperable obstacles in the way of acquiring 
more. In yours, on the contrary, good sense is already present, that intellectual 
habit which is early formed in children, when they are guided, not by authority, 
but by the constant and uniform testimony of their senses ; a habit which, in 
the course of their lives, will guide them into the path of truth, will teach them 
to distmgaish the ideas of which the objects exist, from those of which the 
objects either do not exist or are not known, to distinguish in everything, if 
not the true from the false, at least the line which parts the known from the 
unknown." Further on, he says : '' It is true that the language of such children 
will be scanty, but only because it will be exactly determined. They will soon 
be able to use it in forming analyses and combinations, and for comparison, 
abstraction, and generalization, etc. They will not be great talkers, because 
accustomed to speak only of what they want and understand. The answers of 
Sparta's children were ready and short, because their parents desired to have 
from them only the words necessary to express w'hat they wanted. We need 
not fear that they will become used to taciturnity, and hence that they will not 
find expressions at need. Let them be left a good deal to themselves, to their 
own free activity ; their imaginations will extend the limits of their language. 
Childhood finds relations of similarity between the most dissimilar things. 
Every child is a coachman ; his sticks are his horses, tlie chairs a carriage. 
The poorer his language, the more is the human being driven, by the desire to 
express his thoughts, to find new combinations. The greater our difficulty in 
expressing what we feel, the more is our attention driven inwards, and the more 
entirely do our thoughts become our own. The most truly original poets ap- 
peared when language was poorest," — Novelle Morali e Racconti storici. Discorso 
preliminare. 



READING AND WRITING. 269 

learniucr. It is an external action, which is all the better 
joined to the intellectual action that both are nnited almost 
indivisibly by Nature herself. Thus, if, after showing a 
child the letter «, and teaching him its sound, I make him 
draw its form with his own hand, he will never forget it 
again, for, as Rousseau observed: " Cliildren forget easily 
what they have said or what is said to them, but not what 
they have done or what has been done to them." The 
action, then, the making them do a thing, is the best means 
of teaching it and fixing it in their memory. 

345. But in reading, as in writing, we must, above all 
thino-s, graduate our teaching, and both parts of it must 
be kept constantly in view, i. e., the mechanical and the 
intellectual, both also being duly applied in aid of moral 

progress. 

It is evident that, as language serves admirably to ana- 
lyze the discourse of thought, so reading serves to analyze 
the ivords, decomposing them into the elementary sounds 
of which they consist; and, finally, writing serves to ana- 
lyze the letters themselves, the elements of words, caUing 
attention to each part of which the letters are composed. 
There is, therefore, a progressive analysis to be made, of 
which a wise teacher will know how to avail himself. 

There is, also, a different direction given to attention. 
In mere speaking, our attention ends w4th the thought to be 
expressed, and the signs of the thought composing language 
receive only a slight and relative attention ; but in reading, 
attention is directed to the sound of words; the printed 
characters we look at arrest our attention only for the 
moment necessary to make them the starting-point, as it 
were, for reaching its real object, the sound of the words. 
Finally, in writing, attention is fixed on the letters, the 
forms!^ of which we have to draw a copy with the hand, and 
which become tlie terms of our action. Thus we find the 



270 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

terms of our intellectual action, wherever attention is arrested 
and fixed, wherever it throws its light, leaving the rest in 
darkness, like a torch borne swiftly along, lighting up only 
for an instant each spot it passes over. This law of huiuau 
attention should also be carefully noted by the teacher ; for, 
duly considered, it gives him the means of directing anO 
regulating the child's attention at his pleasure. 

We want, then, a method of teaching reading and writing 
together, given in one book and duly graduated. This is 
another task for those who cultivate the great art of educa- 
tion, toward the accomplishment of which, however, noble 
attempts have already been made. 

ARTICLE V. 

ARITHMETIC. 

346. A similar book should be composed to give children 
graduated teaching in arithmetic. For example : we have 
seen that the child, when he has reached the fourth order 
of cognitions, can form a distinct idea of the number three. 
Hence, as the arithmetic of the previous periods should stop 
at teaching the properties of the numbers one and two, that 
of the present period should be confined to teaching the 
relative properties of one, two, and three, and their various 
combinations, expressing the latter so as at first to bring 
out only the relations between those three simple numbers, 
and, later on, those between their various combinations. 

ARTICLE VI. 

UNIFICATION OF IDEAS AND THOUGHTS. 

347. Besides the forms of knowledge already described, 
as fit to be imparted to a child of the age we are considering, 
it is time now to introduce a right order into his knowledge. 
This attempt to co-ordinate the things he knows should 
begin as soon as his mind is capable of admitting an order 



UNIFICATION OF IDEAS. 271 

in its own ideas, that is, of reducing them to certain 
principles or leading ideas. We have seen that, in the 
preceding period, the human mind begins to work from 
definite principles, which year by year advance in growth 
and completeness. We should make use of these principles, 
as so many central points round which ideas may be grouped. 
If, therefore, these principles begin to appear at the third 
order of cognitions, a wise teacher can already make use of 
them to the advantage of his pupil in the fourth order, 
provided he faithfully observe the grand rule of education 
we have so often repeated, i. e., to make use, in connecting 
the ideas of his pupils, of those principles only which the 
child's mind has already received. If we attempt to make 
him use any others, we demand from him an impossibility. 

Great skill is needed, moreover, to obtain the intellectual 
and moral progress we aim at ; and the ideas commonly 
entertained about the manner of bringing order into the 
cognitions of children are, as a rule, sadly incomplete and 
inadequate. It seems desirable, therefore, to lay down in 
this work the proper order to be introduced into the juvenile 
mind, so as to obtain the 'best possible results. 

348. The wise teacher will endeavor to procure three 
advantages for his pupil, i. e. : 

- (1) The assistance to his memory which is derived from 
the association of his ideas. 

(2) The introduction, so far as it is possible, of unity 
into his thoughts. 

(3) The foundation of this order on a true, not an arbi- 
trary, basis, i. e., on the universal order of things ; for it is 
this which gives moral importance to the unity of thought. 

These three things are widely different, and their differ- 
ences must be carefully noted. They are very apt to be 
confounded together. Sometimes it is believed that all that 
is required in order to introduce order into the human mind 



272 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. • 

is to create the largest possible number of ideal associa- 
tions ; others go farther, but think they have done enough 
when they have brought the child to heap up, as it were, 
all his ideas round a leading idea, or to connect them with 
a given principle, without troubhng themselves as to the 
choice of the connecting idea or principle. They thus 
create a fictitious, instead of a true, order, representing 
rather fallacious human opinions than the reality of nature, 
the immutable truth. 

Section 1. — Association of Ideas. 

349. It must be carefully observed that memory and 
recollection are helped by any kind of association of ideas, 
but that order between the ideas themselves does not come 
from every kind of association ; that it is, on the contrary, 
the association formed from accidental and minute analo- 
gies between incongruous ideas which gives a frivolous, un- 
stable, capricious and wholly illogical character to the mind. 
Delirium itself is maintained by a rapid and extravagant 
association of ideas ; the frivolity of children has the same 
origin. We must then seek for sensible, in Heu of frivolous, 
associations, and that is already no easy matter. It will be 
of some use in smoothing the way to pass in review here the 
principal kinds of association of ideas, or, rather, the various 
grounds on which they can be formed into so many natural 
groups. 

350. The first of these grounds is the unitive force of the 
animal nature, which has very many functions and produces 
innumerable phenomena.^ The intelligent mind lets itself 
at first be guided by the animal nature, and thus, when two 
feelings are united by the animal unitive force, the mind 
sees as united all the ideas or coo-nitions to which those 
feelings correspond. To this unitive force belongs, as its 

1 We must refer to all that we have said elsewhere on this unitive force, and 
the singular phenomena by which it simulates intelligence. {Anthropology, nos. 
455 and foil.) 



ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. 273 

principal function in the matter we are considering, the 
animal fancy or imagination, which joins together the images 
that have once appeared in conjunction, either through con- 
tiguity in space, or succession in time, or some similarity 
in the impressions produced, or some analogy, occasion- 
ally of the most far-fetched kind. Any portion of this 
complex train of images which is awakened in the mind, 
calls up and presents all the others ; and what I have said 
here of complex images, that is, of images resulting from 
several others joined together, no matter how, is true of all 
the other functions of the unitive force. Through it, the 
animal sets in motion, by an instinctive act, not one faculty, 
but a whole group of faculties. This group moves in such 
perfect accord that it is enough that the animal be impelled 
to an act belonging to any one of them, and at once he per- 
forms the actions belonging to all the rest. It is from these 
actions that the intelligence of man receives its materials, 
and hence the act of any one faculty suffices to call up the 
recollection of a whole condition or state of the body, and 
of all those things to which this condition and state are 
referred. The reason of this conjunction of various images, 
sensations, and instincts, which are all acts of the various 
animal faculties, lies wholly in the unity of the subject, in 
which all its powers and their actions are rooted. 

351. The second reason is the unitive force of the intelli- 
gent animal being, man. Through this livman unitive force , 
the order of intelligence is brought into accordance with the 
animal order. Single or isolated action of the latter can 
scarcely take place, without setting in motion the intellect- 
ual order, and vice versa. Man can scarcely act as an 
intelligence without, at the same time, touching some key, 
as it were, of the animal order. ^ 

1 This second ground of the association of ideas is the foundation of all lan- 
guages and all writing. By these artifices man proceeds always from the order of 
sens'e (connections and other visible signs) to the order of the intellect. 



274 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

352. The third ground is the real relation linking together 
ideas and thoughts, as when an elementary idea is contained 
in the wider synthesis of another, or a consequence in its 
principle. Such connection and association as this is widely 
different from the two former kinds, as the following exam- 
ples will show : I meet some one, and immediately the image 
of his parish church is recalled to my mind. This is an as- 
sociation of images, and one which might be connected and 
recalled together in the fancy of a purely sensitive being. 
Here, then, w^e have the first ground of association. Sup- 
pose, on the other hand, that what the sight of that person 
at once recalls to me is the demonstration of a beautiful 
mathematical theorem, which I have heard him expound. 
Here comes in the second ground of association, the unity 
of the animal-intelligent subject, for the association is 
between animal sensations, such as the images of the person, 
of his discourse, etc., and the acts of the mind, such as the 
ideas which made up the demonstration : the union here of 
the two orders, animal and intellectual, is grounded on the 
unity of the subject, man. The case would be the same, 
if the recollection of the mathematical demonstration should 
recall to me the face, or only the name, of the master who 
gave it ; except that in this case the passage would be from 
the intellectual order to that of the senses, instead of, as 
in the former one, from the senses to the intellect. Be it 
observed that in none of these cases is there any intrinsic re- 
lation between the two things associated in our minds. There 
is not the slightest resemblance between a person and the 
tower of a church ; and a person and a mathematical theorem 
are things so unlike, of such a totally different nature, that 
not only can they not be included in, or assimilated with, 
each other, but the one belongs to the order of real things, 
the other to the order of ideal things, and thus they are 
separated by a categorical distinction. This would not be 



ORDER OF IDEAS. 275 

the case if, when a principle recurred to my mind, the 
consequences of that principle, which, taken together, 
form the demonstration of the theorem, should at once 
recur to me also. In this case, ideas recall ideas ; the 
action is entirely within the order of intelligence. The 
action might equally lie within the order of intelligence, 
even though its matter belonged to sense. Thus, if at the 
sight of a man, I at once recall that he is a being com- 
posed of body and soul, there is an association of thoughts ; 
for, between the thought of the man and the thought of 
his component parts, there is an intrinsic and intellectual 
relation, although the thought of the man may have been 
suggested by the senses or the imagination, on the occasion 
of my seeing him or remembering to have seen him. 

It appears, then, that, if we aimed only at aiding the 
child's memory, without regard to the choice of ideas, any 
one of these three species of association would serve our 
purpose. It is evident that the art of constructing an 
artificial memory may be equally well founded on the first, 
second, or third species of association, or upon all three 
together. 

Section 2. — Order of Ideas. 

353. But this, as we have already said, does not suflSce 
for the moral progress of the child. The latter demands 
several thiugs : (1) that the child should learn the relations 
between ideas ; (2) that, by means of these relations, which 
become so many general principles of thought and reasoning 
in his mind, he should acquire facility in passing from the 
one to the other, not by the simple act of recollection, but 
by the use of his own reasoning powers ; (3) that this 
passage should be made by him freely, and not in virtue 
of some unnecessary and casual instinct, so that he may 
gain a mastery over his own cognitions and thoughts, 
keeping them ready to use at will. 



276 ON THE RULING PPJNCIPLE OF METHOD. 

These advantages we can obtain only hy leading the child 
to form associations of the third species, those resting on 
the intrinsic relations of the ideas and things known to 
him. If we consider that each relation between known 
ideas and things is learned by us through a single act of the 
intellect, it will be easy to reduce such relations to a single 
formula, viz., that every intellectual association consists in 
discerning the elementary cognitions composing a complex 
cognition, and in passing from the elementary cognitions to 
the complex one. 

Complex cognitions are: (1) the larger classifications of 
things, including minor classifications as their elements ; 
(2) the ideas of composite things, in which the ideas of the 
component parts are included as elements ; (3) and still 
more general, the principles in which consequences are 
contained as elementary cognitions. 

A good teacher should, therefore, know how to observe 
accurately, and to find out, by opportune questions and 
experiments, what are the classifications formed in the 
child's mind at each period of childhood, together with the 
ideas he has of complex objects and principles. Starting 
from these data, which he finds akeady existing, he should 
make his pupil descend gradually from the widest classifica- 
tion he has framed to narrower ones, and from these ascend 
again to the former, making him analyze the complex ob- 
jects known to him, and from the parts already discerned 
reconstruct the whole. Finally, he should lead him from 
principles — but, be it understood, his own principles not 
another's — to consequences, and back again to principles. 

It is evident that such exercises are admirably adapted 
to bring order into the child's thoughts, by causing him 
always to sum up things under their widest classification, 
teaching him at the same time to distinguish the parts of 
things, but as united in their whole, and attaching, as it 



ORDER OF IDEAS. 277 

were, to the dominant principles, their innumerable conse- 
quences.^ 

It must be evident to all that the child learDs by this 
method what are the natural links between ideas, and 
acquires facility in mentally passing from one to the other, 
besides gaining command over his own thoughts. For, the 
mind which has grasped a wide class of things can, at will, 
pass to the consideration of a smaller class, which, without 
the former, would be impossible to it. Whosoever, there- 
fore, knows a whole, is able to know its parts, and whoso- 
ever has grasped a principle, can, by the virtual extension of 
it, pass at will to all its consequences. It may thus be said, 
with truth, that each man's freedom of thought extends just 
so far as the actual complexity of his cognitions. 

355. In giving this greater attention to intellectual asso- 
ciations, we do not neglect the .two other species of cog- 
nition, derived from the animal, and from the human, 
unitive force, but we co-ordinate, and submit them to rea- 
son, so that man may acquire the mastery over them and 
use them freely for his purposes. And why is it easier 
to learn by heart a discourse which has a meaning to us 
than a mass of disconnected words, thrown together by 
chance? Because to recall the succession of sounds only 
is a mere unreasoning process ; but, if the soi.nds convey 
a meaning, the order of ideas quickly comes to our aid and 
makes even this unreasoning operation easier. 

Vice versa, the animal association assists us in recalling 
ideas, together with their order ; for the order of our ideas 
depends on other connecting ideas, which may be attached 
to visible signs, and thus the visible signs may recall to the 
mind the order we want. But we obtain this result, not 

1 One of the principles most readily manifested in the infant mind is that of 
analogy. By following this natural lead, an immense use may be made of it in the 
instruction of the young; but it must be done with due care to put them on their 
guard agaiust its fallacies. 



278 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

from nature left to herself, but from art. It must have for 
its antecedent a mind which, being already in possession of 
ordered ideas, attaches to them the corresponding sounds. 
The sounds or visible' signs then serve admirably, either to 
communicate to others the same order of ideas and to recall 
to the mind itself the ideas so ordered. This is the history 
of the invention of reading and writing and the reason of 
the enormous assistance they have given to the progress 
of the human mind. 

Section 3. — Moral Order of Ideas. 

356. It is only the association founded on the order 
of ideas that can be of service to morality. 

We have seen that the two first species of association 
are based on the unitive force of the subject : it is the unity 
of the subject which produces them. The third, on the 
contrary, has its reason in the object itself, that is, in the 
truth. This observation suffices of itself to explain why 
the latter species of association alone has a close relation 
to morality. It prepares the way for morality ; for virtue 
consists in nothing else than the voluntary recognition of 
the objective order. ^ 

But the objective order must be completely recognized by 
the will ; and the more completely it is so recognized, the more 
moral does it become, and the more of virtue will there be in 
the man. This means that education should tend: (1) to 
connect the child's ideas and thoughts by their natural and 
true relations, and not by false and arbitrary ones ; (2) that 
this connection of ideas should be as complete as possible. 

It will be seen at once how this doctrine agrees with the 
supreme principle of education I have elsewhere laid down, 
and enunciated as follows : Man must be led to conform 
his mind to the order of things outside of him, and not to 

1 See Principi della Scienza Morale, Cap. IV, 



MORAL ORDEK OF IDEAS. 279 

strive to conform outward things to the casual affections 
of his mind.^ 

357. I have also shown that education should embrace 
the mmd, the hearty and the life of man.^ Now the heart, 
that is, the will together with the affections, should be in 
accordance with the mind, and the life with the heart. If 
the mind is thus conformed to the objective order of things, 
if it possesses the serene light of truth, not the false and 
confusing lights of opinion and prejudice, the heart will have 
a type, as it were, on which to mould itself, and the life will 
be a continual image of the heart. If the life is to be a 
continual working oiit of universal good, the heart must 
first be filled with universal charity ; and the latter cannot 
enter the heart unless the mind is so disposed as to exclude 
no form of knowledge, but to embrace all. The universality 
of an impartial mind produces the universality of the benev- 
olent heart, and the uyiiversality of the benevolent heart 
produces the universality of a good life. The child's mind 
should, then, be educated to recognize all the connections 
of things which he is capable of perceiving at each period 
of his childhood, in other words, all of the objective order 
which he is capable of recognizing, and, to bring him to 
this, the association of things in his mind must not be left 
to chance, but be duly ordered, the most important coming 
first, the less important afterwards. 

358. As being is one, and there are three categories, so, 
likewise, there is one supreme unity in things, and three 
modes of relation. 

The supreme unity is formed by the idea of God, the 
essential being. The unity of God should, then, be made 
predominant in the mind of the child. To God, as the 

1 See Saggio dell* Unifa dell' Educazione, inserted in the Opuscoli Filoso- 
fici, Vol. I., p. 234, and in Vol. II. of this Collection. [Turin, 1883, pp. 1-70.1 

2 Ibid. 



280 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Creator, the Preserver, the Fountain of all Goodness, the 
child should refer all things ; but this must always be done 
by using the idea proper to the period the child hag reached. 
In the first and second orders of cognitions, he conceives 
God as the complement of being : he conceives him as the 
real, intellectual, good, all in one. 

To refer all things to God and merge all things in Him, 
through the widest generality of expression, is, therefore, 
at once- the easiest way and the first step towards making 
children feel and understand the predominance of the idea 
of God, as almost absorbing all others. 

The same idea of God continues in the third order, but 
it is no longer so absorbing ; it is distinguished from other 
ideas, and gains in greatness by the distinction. Already a 
secret sense of adoration may be awakened. Self -surrender, 
the sacrifice of all things to God, is the second step, the 
second mode of subordinating that which is contingent to 
the Supreme Being. 

In the fourth order God is manifested as Will. That 
is, God having been distinguished from His creatures, we 
distinguish in God Himself His perfect will from His intel- 
lectual nature. To conform our own wills without reserve 
to the divine will, to bring into due subordination every 
will to that one alone, is a principle which again gives unity 
to our other ideas in the idea of God. It is the third step, 
the third mode of understanding and perceiving the connec- 
tion between all other things and the Supreme Being. 

In the fifth order some knowledge can be attained of the 
divine precepts, and to accept them with absolute devotion 
is the fourth mode of referring all things to God. 

Finally, in the sixth order, God begins to be known as 
Intelligence or Supreme Reason. It is then only that we 
discern in God the three forms of His being, — the moral, 
the ideal, and the real, — which at first were all indistinctly 



GOD AS IDEAL, REAL, MORAL. 281 

merged in the idea of the AbsoUite. This opens up a fifth 
mode of referring all things to God, grounding in Him the 
reasons of all things, and in all adoring His eternal wisdom. 

These five modes of co-ordinating all created things 
under the supreme unity of the Creator, and thus bringing 
under the highest and most natural order the mind, the 
heart, and the life, should be deeply studied by the en- 
lightened and Christian teacher. How to develop these 
five successive degrees and different kinds of religious 
instruction, and to find the proper methods of applying 
them and gradually introducing them into the minds of 
children, might be made the subject of a book most impor- 
tant and necessary for the furtherance of sound education. 

359. Coming now to the order in the child's cognitions 
which should be derived, at each period of childhood, from 
the categories of being, we find that, as there are three of 
these, so there are three principles of order and unity. 

Let us begin with ideality. This category of things 
derives its unity from universal ideal being. It will be 
desirable, then, to make the child regard in all things 
their being, and to teach him to look upon the modes 
of being which constitute the differences between things 
as simple limitations, or, if you will, acts of it, thus carry- 
ing him down from the largest to the smallest class of things. 
But what shall be the degrees of this scale? They must 
differ in each period ; and the wise teacher will find them 
by teaching the child to talk, and, by watching and reflecting 
on his words, he will discover what classification of things 
he has made for himself at each period. These classi- 
fications will certainly be grounded, as we have akeady 
seen, on semi-abstract ideas ; but the latter will vary with 
the development of the child and constitute classes of vary- 
ing comprehensiveness. In any case, when we have ascer- 
tained what are the semi-abstractions on which the child 



282 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

grounds his classification, we must bring them into order for 
him, make him see which is the larger and which the smaller, 
which contains another and which is contained by it. In 
short, the gradations by which the child descends from ideal 
being to determinate beings should be those already existing 
in his mind, or those nearest to them, those to which he may 
pass easily when the occasion arises. 

360. The next question is how to order the child's 
thoughts concerning reality. Real existences are perceived 
by man as subsisting and acting. 

As regards subsistence, the child should be led to find its 
material elements, and here again be made to pass from the 
more composite to the less composite, for example, from the 
world, as a whole, to its larger parts, and so on to the less 
and less. But the same rule, of speaking to the child only 
of such parts as he has learned to know, should be followed 
here : for instance, from the house he may be led to the idea 
of rooms ; from the idea of the rooms to the several places 
which can be pointed out within them, or something of the 
kind. The child could be brought very early to some knowl- 
edge of chemical principles : a botanical garden, a natural 
history collection, arranged for his use, and other similar 
helps, would greatly assist in the task. All existences can 
then be reduced to the general idea of the universe, and 
ultimately to that of God, as essential subsistence. 

With regard to the action of things, we must, likewise, find 
out what are the definite principles which the child has 
been able to form for himself respecting the powers and 
activities of things, and always use these as guides in 
our teaching. Principles of action, powers, causes become 
by degrees more and more clearly conceived and marked out 
in the child's mind. As soon as the teacher perceives that 
a given principle is already formed there, he should possess 
himself of it, so as to group round it several ideas, and lead 



OEDER OF IDEAS IN THE CHILD'S MIND. 283 

the child to apply it frequently and to as many things as he 
can. In this way, the principles become precious means of 
linking together separate ideas, and give the mind order, 
light, and power. Many of these associations become of 
value to moral progress, as, for e:jf ample, when the child 
advances far enough to know that all men have one origin, 
proceed from one father, and, therefore, constitute a single 
family. 

361. We come now to the third category, that of morality. 
We have shown what are the moral principles which the 
child forms for himself in each of the four orders of cogni- 
tions. It will be the wisdom of the teacher to take these 
as the ground of his moral lessons ; for in no other way can 
he make himself understood by his pupil. To these prin- 
ciples he must continually refer actions, and lead the child 
to apply them himself, thus bringing variety into his ideas 
of action, by rising to their causes. 

CHAPTER IV. 

MORAL EDUCATION CORRESPONDING TO THE FOURTH ORDER OF 

COGNITIONS. 

Maxima dehetur ptiero reverenfia. — Jtjvenal, Sat. xiv. 47. 

362. We have now arrived at education. In treatino- 
of the education corresponding to the fourth order of 
cognitions, we shall follow the same method as hitherto, 
I. e., we shall point out what will be of use, not only 
in this period, but also in all the succeeding ones. 

Let us begin with the necessity of truthfulness in every 
utterance ot the teacher. 

ARTICLE I. 

THE child's credulity SHOULD NOT BE ABUSED. 

363. We have already observed that the child's readiness 
to believe springs from his affection. The abuse of it. 



284 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

therefore, by adults, is an act of base ingratitude. It is 
true that to the thoughtlessness and selfishness of adults 
this proposition is wholly incomprehensible. The child's 
ignorance and weakness, the fact that he is helpless in 
their hands, unable to i:lefend himself or even to plead his 
cause, seem to them sufficient grounds for disregarding tlieir 
tender brother, and believing themselves entitled to make of 
him, and to do to him, what they please, be it good or bad. 

We have also seen that the spontaneous benevolence of 
the child is a moral thing, and duly taught him by nature 
herself. Whosoever, then, abuses the credulity of childhood, 
which is the effect of this benevolence, profanes a sacred 
thing and despises the moral and divine element which gives 
its highest dignity to the intelligent soul. 

Again, we have seen that the child's benevolence should 
not only be carefully respected as a moral thing, but that its 
cultivation should be made a special study and be so di- 
rected that it may preserve and increase its moral value, 
and attain its end, i. e., universality, so that the child shall 
love all persons, and all in their due degree. The ground 
of this universality of benevolence, and the lines it follows, 
will be found in the order of thought which we have recom- 
mended to be gradually introduced into the child's mind, as 
he becomes capable of it. This most excellent order of 
thought is no other than Truth, in its fulness and its 
purest light ; for truth is in itself order, and in the mind 
where there is disorder there is also falsehood. We may 
judge from this what care, what earnestness, what upright- 
ness are required of the parents and teachers of children. 
With what care should these, if they are wise, weigh all 
their words, so as to introduce nothing that is false into 
the child's mind, no vulgar error, no prejudice, no exag- 
gerated opinion, no partial estimates. On the other hand, 
who but the really wise and good will be convinced that 



TEUTHFULNESS. 285 



it is of the utmost importance to keep the child's mmd 
absolutely pure and free from every sort of prejudice, 
whether national, or belonging to family, or condition, or 
rank? Yet only in this way can children be brought into 
the best disposition towards virtue, knowledge, and happi- 
ness. Happy they to whom Providence, in bringmg them 
into the world, has allotted such teachers ! 

3G4 Besides the very serious mischief done to children 
by every seed of falsehood introduced into their minds, the 
want of sincerity and truth in their teachers retards their 
moral development. I have already shown that the child's 
readiness to believe and his docility increase, when he finds 
from experience that what he has believed helps him m 
further processes of reasoning (nos. 33G, 337) ; but, if he 
finds that this help fails him, and what he leaned upon is 
false, his trustfulness will be shaken, instead of confirmed 
and augmented. Nothing can be more pernicious to the 
child's moral nature than the distrust thus engendered. 

"To deceive a child is not only to give him a pernicious 
example, but it is to damage ourselves fatally in his eyes 
forever after, and to renounce his whole education, of which 
we can never again be the instruments. How can we fail to 
feel that our credit in the minds of children depends wholly 
on their profound and intimate conviction that we are 
incapable of deceiving them? Nor let it be imagined that 
their trust will long remain blind. It might, perhaps, if 
they had no reason to doubt us ; but there are people who 
do not even take the trouble to conceal, with any care, the 
bad faith and untruthfulness with which they permit them- 
selves most frequently to treat them ; their empty promises 
come to be known for what they are, and mark an epoch 
in the children's minds. 

"Everything can be atoned for to children except false- 
hood. You may be impatient, violent, unjust for a mo- 



286 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ment ; it is very bad ; but they may forget it. What the 
child most wants to know is whether he can trust you ; the 
whole future in his thought is included in that question. 
If he has found you always true to the letter, your moral 
influence remains intact ; but, if he has once found you false, 
you are henceforth to him only a material and irregular 
force, the action of which cannot be foreseen, and, there- 
fore, need not be taken into consideration." ^ 

ARTICLE II. 
OBEDIENCE NOT TO BE ABUSED. 

365. The same danger that arises from abuse of the 
child's trustfulness arises from abuse of his obedience and 
docility. 

The supreme law of education should be that everything 
in the child, mind, heart, and life, should be true. The 
child's mind maintains its rectitude by following the uni- 
versal order of ideas. ^ The heart preserves its rectitude, 
in like manner, by the orderly universality of its benevolence, 
and the life receives and maintains its rectitude by orderly 

1 Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. III., c. iv. 

2 This universality in thought is similar to the universality in benevolence. 
Sec. III. (nos. 232, 234, and foil. ) We have shown this character of universality in 
benevolence to consist in keeping the heart open, placing no arbitrary limits to its 
affections, so that it may be ever ready to extend them to fresh persons, according 
to their merits. But, just as the heart which has confined itself within arbitrary 
limits, making certain persons the exclusive objects of its affection, shrinks at the 
sight of a stranger, as from an enemy, so does the mind which has entrenched 
itself within certain Imes, beyond which it will not pass, shrink from a new idea. 
Arbitrary opinions and convictions, if they become strong, as generally happens, 
from some secret interested motive, form just that line of limitation by which the 
mind is confined, besieged, and compressed. A mind thus narrowed is hostile to 
every opinion, every doctrine, differing from its own ; every new idea has the 
appearance of an enemy, and it fights against its admission, as dogs against the dog 
that has become a stranger. But what human being is wholly free from this 
propensity of the mind, this wrong mental disposition, this grudge against some 
portion of the truth ? It would be hard to find one, and this becai;se education, 
far from taking provident care to protect the child from so serious an evil, rather 
communicates it recklessly, as by contagion. W'hat a new humanity would cover 
the earth, if this single rule of education came to be understood and universally 
practised! 



RECTITUDE Cff" CONSCIENCE. 287 

and reasonable action, corresponding to the highest order 
of thoughts and affections. By making the child act irra- 
tionally or at haphazard, not to say wrongly, and letting 
him contract habits which have no foundation in nature 
or reason, we warp both his affections and thoughts ; for 
disorder in the life is communicated to the heart and mind : 
these three things are bound up together in intimate com- 
munion. 

It is, then, a great error to make the child a plaything 
for ourselves, instead of looking to his permanent good ; 
to use him as a means, instead of respecting in him the 
dignity of the end. Yet how few parents are altogether 
free from this sin ! Too often the idea that the child is 
their property is the first that enters their heads. Tribal 
laws contributed to strengthen this prejudice in men's 
minds, and Christianity has not yet succeeded in driving 
it out of their mental habit or their customs. 

ARTICLE III. 

^ ON MAINTAINING THE RECTITUDE OF THE CHILD'S CONSCIENCE. 

366. From ignorance of the right way of commanding 
obedience, and from failure to direct aright the child's 
actions towards his own best good, his conscience soon 
begins to be warped. The duties of parents and teachers, 
in the formation of conscience within him, are amongst the 
gravest and most difficult to fulfil. Of these, then, we must 
now speak, and we will take up the argument again from 
the beginning. 

To the smile on a human face the child responds by his 
earliest act of intelligence, which is, at the same time, an 
act of benevolence. This benevolence we have shown to 
have a moral character. Hence, we may see the admirable 
design of Providence in placing in the mother's heart that 
ineffable love by which man's intelligence and moral nature 



288 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OP METHOD. 

are most fitly stimulated on his first entrance into this 
world. We may see also that the mother's tenderness, far 
from being injurious to the child, is that which speaks to 
him, inviting and drawing him on, from the first, to know 
another's intelligence and goodness, to which he must needs 
show love and reverence, in proportion as it shows itself 
good and loving to him. 

But soon comes the danger that all his affections will 
be spent on a few objects, and, therefore, care should be 
taken, as we said before, that his heart be not closed against 
any kindly intelligence, and especially" not to oppose to any 
such intelligence a feeling of malevolence. 

367. The time comes, and it is that of the third order of 
cognitions, when the child learns, through language, that the 
beings who have been revealed to him from the first, in the 
light of goodness and lovableness, have also a will ; and his 
first impulse is to conform himself to this, to live in it, with- 
out any thought of himself. This, again, is an eminently 
moral act. But we must observe here tliat this disposition 
to obey, to conform to the will of another, springs from the 
belief, which has grown up in him, that that will must be 
good, because the being who exercises it is good. Hence 
his spontaneous obedience is readier in proportion as he 
loves and esteems the intelligent being he obeys, and his 
love and esteem are great in proportion to the goodness 
he perceives in this being. Now, if we consider the child's 
means of measuring the goodness of the intelligent beings 
with whom he comes in contact, we shall find that his judg- 
ment can rest only on such data as his age admits of. If a 
being corresponds with these data, he is just and righteous ; 
for moral justice and rectitude must always be relative to 
the subject, that is, relative to the mode in which the object 
is perceived by the subject. The only data possible at that 
tender age are those supplied by that immediate communion 



RECTITUDE OF CONSCIENCE. 289 

of souls, of which we have spoken, between the infant and 
the persons around him, as taking phice tlu'ough smiles, 
kisses, caresses, sensible pleasures given him, services ren- 
dered to him. The more lovingly he is treated, the more of 
goodness does he perceive in the being that so treats him, 
and he rightly responds to it with love and obedience. 

This explains, in the first place, why the child's obedience 
is not the same towards every one, being absolute towards 
certain persons and alpaost nil towards others : it also ex- 
plains why he appears to feel keen remorse when he has 
disobeyed, say, his mother, and little or none in the case 
of others, and why his mother's will, and not that of others, 
becomes his a])iding rule of action. This fact is noted by 
a mother, with her usual delicacy of observation. 

" I have akeady said that an affectionate child believes 
himself generally to belong to one person.^ It is to this 
person he feels himself responsible for his actions ; with 
others his relations are far less intimate. He sets himself 
right with other authorities as he can ; but the reproaches 
of his true ruler go to his heart. That ruler is to him a 
conscience, by whose judgment, which he foresees, he is 
absolved or condemned. It is this one that his imagination 
pictures in the decisive moment of trial. Often the imagi- 
nation is so vivid that disobedience becomes impossible ; 
and, through the not unnatural effect of strong illusion, he 
even believes himself seen by that person, whose knowledge 

1 There is no doubt that the child has the perception of power in his mother, 
but of a beneficent and, therefore, rightful power, — a dominion. This idea of 
poiver is wholly different from the naked one of force ; indeed, the idea of brute 
force remains for a long time inconceivable to the young child. Power includes, 
in his thought, goodness, because kindness, or, at least, beneficence, must come 
from power. The child, then, conceives in his mother this power of beneficence, 
an absolute power to which he loves to give himself up, to surrender himself 
utterly, thereby recognizing the legitimacy of the dominion she exercises over 
him. This is- the true dominion, the highest moral authority. The child's ideas 
are always of more value than those of philosophers. 



290 ON THE RULIlfG PRINCIPLE OE METHOD. 

of what he has done at a distance is, therefore, no surprise 
to him. At that age, the idea of an invisible looker-ou has 
nothing offensive in it.-*^ 

But if, through forgetfuhiess or weakness, the child has 
yielded to temptation, when he finds himself again in the 
presence of his ruler, remorse enters into his heart. He 
might meet without emotion the owner of the fruit or 
flowers he has stolen ; but he reddens with confusion, if he 
finds himself before the representative of his conscience. 
It is to this one he makes his confessions and enters into 
tender and touching explanations. It is towards this one 
that he feels the need of expiation, so natural to a guilty 
heart, conscious of serious wrong-doing ; sometimes he will 
even punish himself.^ 

We may note by the way that this explains the apparent 
fluctuations of infant morality. Founded upon the affec- 
tions, it must appear as mobile as they ; but none the less 
it has a moral value^ and a stable principle, that of respect- 
ing and loving goodness in beings. 

368. Let us go on to the duty of the educator towards the 
incipient conscience of the child. In the first place, we 
have shown that, if he can maintain a universal and regu- 
lated benevolence ^ in the child's mind, this will prove an ex- 
cellent rule of morality to give and maintain ; and the child 
will quietly direct and restrain by it his affections and ac- 
tions. As yet, however, there is in him no principle of moral 
conscience. He has reached the fourth order of cognitions 



» Another reason for this is, that the human mind, before it has learned from 
experience the limitations of things, conceives everything, as we have observed, 
without limitation ; the form of the mind being itself unlimited, and illimitable 
being that in which, and through which, it sees all things. 

2 Echication Progressive, L. III., oh. vi. 

3 On this account, I consider not only ill-usage, but whatever can alarm the 
child's imagination, very prejudicial to infant morality ; for the imagination of 
fear makes the child conceive objects worse and more odious than even those 
which cause him pain. 



RECTITUDE OF CONSCIENCE. 291 

and, having learned to know a positive will, he has judged 
and recognized it as his future rule of action, to which his 
physical gratifications must be postponed ; but he is unable 
to judge tliat this will is good from its intrinsic reasonable- 
ness, and deems it good only because of his conviction that 
the being who exercises it is good. It is when the collision 
comes between the tvill of another and his own physical 
tendencies that, in the judgment of preference for the one 
or the other, in his temptation and fall, arises the first dawn 
of conscience in his soul, called up by the remorse which 
he feels, or, at least, has a presentiment of. 

The duty of the educator relatively to the incipient con- 
science of the child consists, then, in always manifesting a 
will that is good in relation to him ; for, that will being the 
child's rule of action, if it is good, the rule will be good ; and 
he will esteem and love it, if, so far as his small means of 
knowledge extend, he can see it to be good and estimable. 

We have thus to consider these two important points and 
to answer these two questions : (1) In what must consist 
the goodness of the educator's will, which is the moral rule 
of the child at the fourth order of cognitions? (2) How 
is it good relatively to him, that is, in such sort that the 
child can himself recognize its goodness and adopt it, of 
his own accord, as his rule of conduct? 

f 

Section l.—In tvhat Way the Will of the Educator, which is the Child's 
Siqyreme Law, should be good. 

369. We have already stated that the child, when he first 
learns, by means of language, that his parents and teachers 
have a will worthy of his entire respect and affection, cannot 
judge of its goodness by any intrinsic reason, ^. e., whether 
it is in its nature reasonable or unreasonable, just or un- 
just. But, although they need not fear in him a censor 
and a judge, they must respect an intelligent creature ; they 



292 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

must keep watch for the conscience about to awaken in 
that infant human being, — a conscience which will not be 
true and conformed to nature, if we make the child believe 
evil to be good, thus falsif3dng by anticipation his moral 
judgments and teaching him to contract fatal habits. 

Section 2. — The Will of the Educator, being the Child's Supreme Bule at that 
Age, should he good tcith a Goodness that the Child can recognize. 

370. Assuming, then, that in the rule imposed on the child 
there is nothing dishonest, unjust, excessive, or violent, we 
have yet to find how the child himself can be made to 
recognize as good the will expressed by his parents. 

Here, again, w^e must look only to those few means he has 
of knowing and judging it to be good, and not require him 
to use means which his understanding does not yet possess. 

In the first place, then, it is not to be expected that he 
should understand the intrinsic reasonableness of the things 
required of him, which is altogether beyond him at that 
stage of development. We must fall back on the intrinsic 
data by which the child will judge, and these are the two 
following : 

1. The child will judge the things which are required of 
him, and which are the general expression of the will of his 
mother or of his teachers to be good, if they are in accord- 
ance with his spontaneous impulses. 

2. If the things required of him are indifferent, that is, 
neither in accordance with, nor opposed to, his spontaneous 
impulses, he will judge them good, because of the idea of 
a good, estimable, lovable being which he has naturally 
formed to himself of the being whose will is thus mani- 
fested to him. 

3. If the things required of him by the being whose 
goodness he thus assumes sliould be repugnant to him, he 
is yet convinced that he should put them before his own 



DEVELOPMENT OF CONSCIENCE. 293 

sensible satisfaction, and avoid, above all, things displeasing 
to the person he loves and esteems. Should these things 
be persistently and seriously painful to him, and the person 
imposing them give him no signs of love to feed his love 
and respect, they might end by destroying his first-formed 
belief in the goodness of that being ; but it would be hard 
to destroy it entirely. If, however, these hard commands, 
opposed to his own will and feelings, come seldom, and, 
as it were, accidentally, there begins, in the fulness of his 
respect and love, that terrible struggle already mentioned, 
in which his virtue is either defeated, or, if victorious, issues 
from it all the stronger. Before his fall, however, he tries 
every means of avoiding the contest ; to conciliate, if pos- 
sible, his two needs, physical and moral ; to bend, I mean, 
the will of his superior to his, striving to get a modification 
or withdrawal of the command. This desire to influence 
belongs to this period of childhood, and manifests itself at 
the fourth order of cognitions. 

There is, clearly, no difficulty about requiring things that 
are either pleasant or indifferent to the child, and our only 
duty is to take care that they are reasonable and serviceable 
to him. The difficulty begins when we have to command 
things contrary to the child's inclinations and spontaneous 
impulses. With regard to these, it is the duty of the mother, 
nurse, or whoever has charge of the child, not only to be 
sure that the things are reasonable and of use to the child, 
but to choose, with the greatest care and prudence, amongst 
these useful and fitting things, those that are really neces- 
sary. 

371. And, to begin with the child's desire to influence the 
will of those above him, it should not be needlessly opposed, 
but rather gratified and yielded to, whenever this can be done 
without detriment to him, that he may experience in this 
also the goodness which surrounds him. On the other hand, 



294 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

he must be taught by firm opposition, when the occasion 
arises, that it is only from love, never from weakness, that 
he is indulged.-^ 

It need scarcely be said that it is sheer inhumanity to 
demand from the child what is excessively liard for him, 
and to treat him continually with a harshness which mu^t 
destroy his natural conception of us as good. Ill usage of 
this kind, long continued, may harden his heart and in- 
cline it to gloom and cruelty, while closing it to love. 

But will it be in our power to foster his incipient virtue ? 
Yes, assuredly, as has been alread}^ shown (nos. 227 and 
foil.) ; but here the greatest care and thought will be needed, 
to measure the degrees of his temptation. The child must 
be required to pass the trial whenever needful ; but even 
then care must be taken that the temptation be not be- 
yond his strength. The greater his love and respect, the 
greater will be his power of resistance in the struggle, which 
is, in fact, a struggle between his respect and affection for 
the person he loves and some sensible gratification. The 
amount of the former, by which he subdues his desire, is the 
measure of the moral strength he can exert. What sagacity 
is needed to take this measure accurately ! He may, indeed, 

1 Rousseau, who is always hard upon children, the secret of whose souls he 
never penetrated, says that the refusal of the parent should in every case be 
irrevocable ; that the no once pronounced should be as a wall of bronze. I know 
no finer confutation of this excessive severity than the following, by a mother, — 
Mad. Guizot, in her Lettres de Famille sur V Education, Li. XXI. Such of my read- 
ers as have read, or may read it, will be able to judge for themselves ; for those 
whom the book may not reach I will quote a passage : "7/ n'yapas une mere d 
qui je n'aie entendu reprocher sa faiblesse. Eh.' oui, certainement nous sommes 
faibles, et c'est pour etre faibles que le del nous fit meres. 11 nous a voulu appro- 
priees a I'enfant, ainsi que le vHement qui le couvre, Valiment qui le nourrit. II 
nous a donne poiir le comprendre un instinct, des organes qui ne petwent serinr qu'd, 
nos communications avec hoi; une faculte de craindre, de souffrir, de pardonner ou 
de ceder, sans rapport avec le reste de notre existence, avec V ensemble de noire 
caraciere, une faiblesse qui nest que p>our lui comme notre lait." The love and 
intelligence given by God to mothers is a fact of a special kind, worthy of pro- 
found meditation by the philosopher. 



DEVELOPMENT OF CONSCIENCE. 295 

be helped iu the conflict by caresses, by gifts, by sweetening 
as much as possible the pill he has to swallow, and all 
these means are legitimate at that age, when needful. I 
say 'when needful,' because, otherwise, it is better that he 
should be left to fight and conquer by himself. He is mor- 
ally the better for it ; his virtue is strengthened and his 
practical force healthily developed. 

Section 3. — Hoio the Child should he led upicards from the Knoivledge of the 
Goodness proper to the human Will, to Knowledge of the Goodness proper 
to the Divine Will. 

372. The most important means of keeping unwarped the 
dawning conscience of the child, without which we shall 
never succeed in keeping it pure, true, unfailing, consists 
in teaching him that in God also there exists a will, a will 
which is the highest, which is supreme over all other wills, 
and that to it we owe absolute obedience, and must conform 
to it in all things, even to suffering all things, and must 
subordinate to it every other will. 

We must not require of him that he should conceive the 
divine will as wise, which is bej^ond his capacity ; but he has 
no difficulty in conceiving it as the will of a Being supreme, 
absolute, and best, whose will must also be the highest, the 
most venerable, and, beyond all thought, the best. He is, 
indeed, as yet incapable of understanding the goodness of 
God's will from its effects ; but he understands it through 
the conception he has formed of God, a conception natural 
to man, because it is natural to him to conceive the infinite 
and the absolute, before he can understand the words or 
use them to express his thought. It would, therefore, be a 
mistake to try and persuade him of these things by argu- 
ment. It is enough to present to his mind the existence of 
a being, great and good beyond measure, whose will is also 
beyond measure powerful and good. Without any proof, he 
will immediately receive, and unhesitatingly assent, to what 



296 ON THE EULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

approves itself to him as essential^ true, through an ex- 
tremely brief process of reasoning, which his mind, impelled 
by the intimate laws of its nature, works out for itself, 
without, however, reflecting upon it afterwards, or being 
able to explain it or express it to others in words. ^ 

373. And the first of all means of communicating these 
great thoughts to children is through the natural and most 
efficacious channel of language, which they understand by 
that wonderful faculty of entering into the thoughts and 
feelings of others, which we call sympathy. 

" We are told," says Mad. de Saussure, " that very pious 

1 When a phenomenon repeats itself constantly, it indicates a law of nature on 
which it depends. The readiness with which children constantly receive and wel- 
come an idea so exalted as that of God, and their implicit belief in His existence, 
are manifest proofs that this idea and belief find support in an inward law of the 
mind. I do not appeal here to philosophers, who speak of cliildren without know- 
ing them, but to intelligent mothers and observers, and to all who have had the 
care of children from their earliest infancy, all of whom will bear witness to the 
constant and most important fact of which I speak. " That which man conceives 
most easily is the unlimited, the infinite ; that which he conceives late and with ex- 
treme difficulty, and, perhaps, never conceives completely, are the limitations of 
things." Those acquamted with our theory of the unlimited form of being through 
which man attains all his knowledge, will see not only the fact, but the reason of the 
fact. Leaving the reason aside, however, for a moment, it will be useful to compare 
what takes place in the child with what takes place in primitive races. The phenom- 
ena manifested in the infancy of races are a reproduction and a confirmation of those 
manifested in the mfancy of the individual. In finding them thus repeated, we are 
assured that we were not mistaken in our observation of them. Now, if we analyze 
the immense inclination to idolatry manifested in the early ages of all peoples, we 
shall see that such a fact comes under the psychological law of man's inclination to 
see everywhere the unbounded, the infinite, and his immense difficulty in seeing and 
noting the limitations of things. This will be better understood by recalling what 
we have said on j^ei'ception, as at first imperfect, and afterwards successively per- 
fected (nos. 104- 120). The mind, at first, does not attend to all that is contained in 
a sensation, but is satisfied with learning from it that a being subsists, and goes no 
further, leaving the determinations of the being undeveloped in the sense. There 
remains, therefore, in the judgment of the understanding, a being subsistent but 
indeterminate and vague, without any horizon, as it were. At this stage, however, 
the mind does not yet pronounce that it is unlimited ; it affirms nothing about its 
limits, whether it has any or none ; but it easily inclines in this state to judge that 
the thing is infinite ; it is enough that it should be moved to such a judgment by a 
strong feeling, a vehement affection, a deep passion or an exalted sense of wonder. 
In such cases, not only is the entity felt, but a judgment is added concerning its 
greatness. This greatness declares it infinite, simply because its limits are so re- 



DEVELOPMENT OF CONSCIENCE. 297 

teachers are successful in teaching abstract dogmas ; but 
may not their success be the result of their piety rather than 
of their method? They influence by the feeling which in- 
spires them ; they transmit, unconsciously, their own fervor. 
It frequently happens that convictions are communicated by 
means which were least thought of. This power of sympa- 
thy, this readiness of one flame to kindle another in the 
child's mind, shows what power women can exert, and won- 
derfully exalts their position. On them depends the religion 
of future generations. . . . "When that which is sacred to 
the mother," says Jean Paul Richter, " is addressed to that 

mote that the attention cannot reach them. Thus, the human mind is less apt to 
observe the limits of things, in proportion to the remoteness of the Imiits, in pro- 
portion to the greatness of the thing, especially if it seems great to passion, which 
delights in the greatness of its object, and wishes to find it without limitations of 
any kind. We have, then, two psychological causes of idolatry : the first, ideolog- 
ical, founded on man's facility in thinking the unlimited, and his difliculty in 
thinking limitations ; the second, moral, founded on his feeling of the greatness 
of things, and his passion, which desires them to be unlimited. In proportion to its 
development, the human understanding becomes more and more apt to observe and 
determine with accuracy the limitations of thuigs, and thus finds it more and more 
diflicult to divinize tlie things themselves. Yet, it never loses altogether its prim- 
itive tendency towards the unlimited, and, therefore, it retains the desire to cre- 
ate for itself an illusion, which can never be complete, but which can never fail, 
altogether ; for, if the mind could not produce some illusion by its effects, it would 
cease making them. It seeks, therefore, still to deceive itself, but with its eyes 
open, so that it cannot altogether succeed. I will give an example. Cicero de- 
clares unequivocally his conviction that the gods honored in Home were not real 
gods, but men, to whom divine honors were paid. His primitive illusion had, there- 
fore, been dispelled by the progress of his reason. But his daughter dies ; and 
Nature, re-awakening within him, makes him try to deify his lost Tulliola, and 
weave for himself some illusion, which shall console him in spite of his reason. 
The words preserved for us by Lactantius, with which the great orator sought to 
justify this attempt, are as follows: " Cum vera et mares et fseminas comjilures 
ex homlnibus in Deorum numero esse videamus, et eomm in urbibus atque agris 
aiigustissima delubra veneremur, asscntiamur eorum sapientix, quorum ingenUs et 
inventis omnem intam legibus et institutis excultam conslitutamque habemus. 
Quod si nullum unquam animal consecrandum fuit (here is the expression of his 
({owhi) illo prof ecto fuit. Si Cadml jirogenies, aut Amphitrijonis, aut Tyndariin 
ccelum tollenda fama fuit, huic idem honos certe dicandus est. Quod quidem 
faciam, tcque omnium optimam, doctissimamque, adprobantlbus Diis immortal ibus 
ipsis, in eorum c(ztu locatam ad opinionem omvium mortalium consecrabo.^^ These 
words are taken from the book which Cicero wrote to console himself for the 
death of his daughter. See Lactant., Inst if., 1. 15. 



298 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which is sacred in the child, their two souls understand and 
answer each other." ^ 

These feelings, transmitted by the intimate communion of 
souls, must, however, be clothed in fitting words. Nor 
must we neglect to show forth the divine goodness and 
greatness in their effects, — not by argument, but only by 
affirming that all things come from God, that He is the foun- 
tain of all good to all men.^ Hence, thauksgivirig is the most 

1 It is the great error of a false philosophy, which has taken root principally in 
Germany, to insist on giving religious instruction entirely through argumentative 
reasoning and demonstrations. This false nietliod arises from ignorance of the 
nature of human intelligence and its modes of action. The child, it is said, must 
exert its intelligence : so far, we are agreed ; but I would suggest that the diffi- 
culty would be in making the child act without exerting his intelligence; for, his 
nature being intelligent, he must act in accordance with his nature. But, instead of 
letting the child's intelligence follow its natural path of advance, an attempt is 
made to guide it by artificial methods into paths that are not its own, and it is de- 
clared not to be intelligent, unless it abandons the laws of its nature and submits 
to those arbitrarily imposed by the presumptuous and tyrannical ignorance of the 
philosopher. The latter believes that he alone reasons. He sees in the child no 
other light of reason than that which he will impart to him, on condition of his 
ceasing to be the pupil of nature. But the sagacious observer, unlike the pedants 
of whom we speak, arrives at the conviction that intelligent nature has secret 
methods of its own, independent of the arguments of human philosophies, and that 
the child gets lost and confused, instead of enlightened, when, instead of following 
these natural methods, those intimate processes of reasoning which carry him, by 
a secret road, straight and surely to the truth, he is forced to adopt the uncertain 
and often fallacious arguments of the adult, as if they were the sole guarantees of 
authenticity. Let those who, against the higher feeling of antiquity, would reason 
out even the catechism, that is, fill it with human and scholastic arguments, pon- 
der on these facts. The evil began with German philosophy, but has now spread to 
France, as may be seen from the poor .... catechism which is printed in Paris. 
I hope that the good sense of the Italians will preserve them from being deceived 
by the speciousness of a method so opposed to the intimate laws of the human 
intellect. Let me conclude with the noble observations on this subject of a Protes- 
tant lady: "I have already declared myself against the use of proof. I would 
banish it, not only as hurtful to feeling, if it exists, but as delaying its appearance, 
if it does not exist. I have yet another motive. Every proof presupposes a doubt, 
and it is often easier to excite the latter than to dispel it. If the truth we want to 
establish were self-evident, no one would take the trouble of demonstrating it : 
to justify the use of a demonstration, we must brir.g forward the contrary proposi- 
tions. We have here, then, a double lesson, one of error, in order to confute it, 
and one of truth, to stamp it on the mind ; but the first is, to say the least, mineces- 
sary, and too often leaves its traces behind." — Mad. Neckeb de Saussure, 
L. III., c. viii. 



DEVELOPMENT OF CONSCIENCE. 299 

fitting act of worship at that age, and children should be led 
to perform it as often as possible. There is beauty in the 
short prayer which Mrs. Hamilton proposes to suggest to a 
child, whenever he receives a kindness : " My God, I thank 
thee for havino- made such an one so oood to me ! " 

By exercises like these, the child's mind is led to more and 
more knowledge of the first cause of all, the universal foun- 
tain of good ; led to distinguish it from secondary causes, 
and to prefer it to all human beings, however good they may 
appear, and, moreover, to enter into direct communication 
with it. When this most perfect being is brought so near to 
the child, and becomes known to him, as the origin of all 
good, we need no longer fear lest the will of man should 
take a higher place in his heart than the will of God : the 
latter becomes the supreme rule, the former the subordinate 
one. This is what most concerns us, in order that conscience 
be not warped in its formation : this is the aim, the first 
endeavor, of parents who are truly Christian, and who desire 
to educate for God the beloved pledges entrusted to them 
by God. 



SECTION VI. 

THE COGNITIONS OF THE FIFTH ORDER, AND THE 
EDUCATION CORRESPONDING TO THEM. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE DEVELOPMENT OF INTELLIGENCE WHICH TAKES PLACE IN 

THE FIFTH ORDER. 

374. The classification of the cognitions belonging to the 
fifth order will be easily made, if we attend to the principle, 
that the cognitions of a given order consist in the relations 
which the mind discovers, through reflection, between the 
cognitions of the orders below it, and by observing the 
same method of classification as in the preceding orders 
(nos. 253, 301). 

In addition to this, before entering on the discussion of 
a given order of cognitions, it will be well to bear in mind 
that the cognitions of a given order are not all formed with 
equal care or at the same age ; those only being formed to 
which the mind directs its attention, and its attention being 
aroused and directed only b}^ the stimulus of wants, some 
of which make themselves constantly felt at a certain age, 
while others are felt sooner or later, according to accidental 
circumstances. 

Finally, it must be remembered that, as we have already 
said, the mind, while working on a given order of cognitions, 
is not idle as regards cognitions of inferior orders, but goes 
on developing these in proportion to the pressure of new 
wants and in correspondence with them. 

We will now go on and point out some indications of 
the development which the mind attains of itself, through 

300 



COGNITIONS OF THE FIFTH ORDER. 301 

the fifth order of cognitions, which is generally suflficiently 
marked in the child's fourth year. 

ARTICLE I. 

PROCESSES BY WHICH COGNITIONS OF THE FIFTH ORDER ARE FORMED. 

Section 1. — Synthetic Judgment of the Third Species. 

375. The mental operation proper to the fifth order is 
synthesis of the third species. 

The "first species consists in perception (first order), the 
second in predicating the qualities of things (third order) : 
of what then does the third species consist? 

This is prepared by the preceding analysis. The analysis 
of the fourth order we have seen to consist in the decomposi- 
tion of elements (no. 302), by which the mind discovers that 
a subject is the result of two elements, — the one, a thing of 
which something is predicated ; the other, a thing which is 
predicated. 

In grasping these two elements, as constituent parts of one 
and the same thing, the mind has already begun to compare 
them, and, therefore, we have said that the process of com- 
parison begins in tlie human mind with the analysis proper 
to the fourth order ; but, on closer reflection, we find that 
such comparison is rather virtually than actually comprised 
in the analysis. Let us explain : the process by which the 
mind notes two things in the one subject present to it, say 
the substance and the accident, does not actually consist in 
the express comparison of the one with the other, but in the 
implicit perception that the substance is not the accident, 
or the accident the substance, although both are known to 
belong to a simple object. Now, the perception that the 
substance is not the accident does implicitly contain the 
comparison which reveals the relation of difference and 
opposition between these two parts ; but such a comparison 
is not yet the process by which substance and accident are 



302 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

decomposed and distinguished, though the latter is implied 
and supposed by it. 

Here we must note with the greatest care an important 
fact in the human mind, ^. e., the double character of its 
processes. 

Sometimes these processes are carried on by the mind 
expressly and explicitly, and then they are easy to observe : 
they constitute the specific form of its activity, which termi- 
nates in that form, and is, so to speak, shaped by it. At 
other times, the mind carries on the same processes in the 
most cursory manner, not looking for any term or rest in 
them, but solely using them as steps or means to other pro- 
cesses, which it makes its end. The latter it marks with care, 
because it wants them for themselves ; but it passes rapidly 
over the others, which it wants only as means to its end. 

Hence, when there is comparison in the elementary de- 
composition of a subject, the mind makes it rapidly, im- 
perfectly, and only in so far as it is a necessary step to the 
knowledge that there are two parts, two elements, constitut- 
ing the subject, and not one alone. For this knowledge it 
is sufficient to perceive that the one element is not the other, 
without going on to determine what are the differences be- 
tween them ; and, although the perception of a relation is 
involved in knowing that the one element is not the other, 
i. e., a relation of diversity, yet the mind does not see this 
relation abstractly and in itself : it sees the two parts, but 
does not dwell on their duality, as such. Having premised 
this, we shall be able to understand in what the synthe- 
sis of the third species consists, which is the operation 
proper to the mind in the fifth order of cognitions. 

376. The anaWsis of the fourth order having verified the 
existence of two different things which combine into one, 
the synthesis which takes place in the fifth order follows, to 
discover the relations between these two elements. Svnthe- 



SYNTHETIC JUDGMENTS OF THE THIRD SPECIES. 303 

sis of the third species consists, therefore, in determining 
the relations between two things which combine into one. 

From this definition it will be seen thtft, in such a syn- 
thesis, the process of comparison appears in express and 
distinct form, not cursorily and accidentally, as in the pre- 
vious analysis ; that, moreover, the relation,^ which is the 
result of the comparison, is also seen in a determinate form, 
and not in a general and imperfect one, as before. 

Not only are subject and predicate bound together by 
relations, but the latter may be found between any two 
things which present themselves together, and between 
which there is some connection making the mind regard 
them as a unity, a complete object of thought. 

With respect to subjects and predicates, the mind can 
discover what the law is which unites them in one object, 
whether accident, or necessity, or the essential nature of the 
thing ; so that the distinction between them is one of con- 
ception, not of actual truth. 

If there are two objects, they may be viewed together in 
a complex thought, through the relation of similarity or dif- 
ference,^ of cause and effect, or any other that may be 
chosen. 



1 For the distinction between comparison and the relations discovered by com- 
parisonj see // Rinnoramento, etc., L. II., c. xxx. 

• 2 It will be said that to discover differences is to perform an analysis, not a syn- 
thesis. 1 answer that even the process of differentiation varies with the order of 
cognition at which the mind performing it has arrived. In the fourth order, to 
differentiate is to analyze, as we have seen (nos. 307, 308) ; but, in the fifth order, this 
same differentiation becomes a synthesis. The reason of this is that, in the fom-th 
order, the differences are taken into account, but not the objects in which they 
appear ; in the fifth order, the objects are tal<en into account and the differences 
are considered as a relation which coiniects them mentally, combining them into 
one complex thought. According to the first method of differentiation, the seven 
colors remain distinct things. On the other hand, if I think of color in general, 
and then set myself to examine what modifications are to be distinguished in it, 
the seven colors become the principal modifications of color in general, forming 
a unity, and their very differences, serve to determine the relation which exists 
between each of them and color in general. 



304 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF MET^IOD. 

Section 2. — Analytical Judgments belonging to the Fifth Order of Cognitions. 

^11. The analytical judgments formed by the human 
mind at the fifth* order of cognitions are of the second, and 
also of the first, species. 

The materials for this analysis are prepared by the pre- 
ceding synthesis, i. e., that of the fourth order or before it. 
This will be easily understood, if we remember that, in each 
order, besides the processes peculiar to it, other processes go 
on, which, from their nature, belong to preceding orders, but 
which, from special circumstances, have been deferred till 
now. 

For example : to predicate something of another thing is 
the synthetic process which belongs to the third order, in 
which such synthesis first appears. But it is evident that 
the mind, in the third order, can predicate one thing of an- 
other only on condition that it has : (1) the concept of the 
thing predicated ; (2) the concept of the thing of which it is 
predicated. Hence this process must remain unperformed 
in the third order, whenever the human mind, having reached 
that stage, has failed to conceive either the predicate or the 
subject. This would be the case in predicating action of 
an agent. 

We have seen that the abstraction of actions does not 
take place before the third order, or, rather, cannot take 
place sooner. Thus, all judgments and intellectual pro- 
cesses concerned with actions and agents are delayed one 
stage, and, while, in the third order, actions are considered 
in the abstract, it is only in the fourth that the synthesis by 
which they are predicated of a subject agent can take place 
(nos. 304, 305), and, finally, only in the fifth can the agent 
be analyzed, that is, divided from his act, and agent and act 
considered as parts or elements of one subject, which is the 
elementary analysis proper to the fourth order, but which 
is accidentally protracted and deferred by the mind till the 
fifth. 



ANALYTIC JUDGMENTS OF THE FIFTH ORDER. 305 

378. Now, this analysis of the second species, but belong- 
ing to the fifth order, is an operation of infinite importance, 
to both the intellectual and moral progress of the child. 

The attribution of an act to a subject is as yet only the 
recognition of a fact in itself of no consequence. Such a 
synthesis appears to me nothing more than placing action 
in an entity. But if, after uniting the action and the subject, 
and thus forming them into one whole, the agent, I again 
consider the agent, and distinguish the action and the sub- 
ject in him, as two elements of one whole, I open the way 
to discover their relation^ every relation between that action 
and that subject. I need but one step more to enable me to 
arrive at a most important truth in the domain of morality, 
i. e., that the value of the action belongs to the agent, and, 
therefore, that I am bound to esteem the agent in proportion 
to the worth of his action. This step will be taken in the 
next order, the sixth, in which will begin, in the child's 
mind, the distinct idea of the imputability of actions, and 
the way to the formation of this great idea is prepared in 
the fifth order. 

Section 3. — Disjunctive Ratiocination. 

379. We may attribute to the fifth order the process of 
the disjunctive syllogism, or, at least, the formation of its 
major premise. 

This major premise may be reduced to the following 
formula : Of the two only ways in which a thing can be 
(whether as done or happening) , it must be done or happen 
in one or the other. Now, to conceive this proposition, it 
is necessary, first, to have the complex idea of the two ways 
in which a thing can be, or be done, or happen, and, more- 
over, to have observed the relation of opposition between 
them, — that the one excludes the other. ^ But we have 

1 We are speaking here of modes of being, not of being itself. There is, indeed, 
a disjunctive proposition with respect to being, at which the mind, possibly, arrives 



306 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

seen that it is only at the fifth order that the human mind 
comes to distinguish two things in a single concept, and to 
note the relation between them, through synthesis of the 
thkd species. Hence it appears that, previous to the fifth 
order, the human understanding is incapable of conceiving 
the major premise of the syllogism termed disjunctive. 

380. The necessity by which a thing can exist only in one 
of two ways is sometimes metaphysical, sometimes physical, 
sometimes merely positive, or optionally physical. That a 
thing must be or not be, is an alternative of physical neces- 
sity, and the same holds good of all propositions of which 
the two parts are formed by the affirmative and negative 
(principle of contradiction) . If I take one ball out of a bag 
wherein I had previously placed two, there is physical neces- 
sity that it should be one of these two. That the child must 
be rewarded or punished for a given action, is an optional 
physical necessity, — physical, that is, but conditioned by 
the will of the teacher, who promised the reward or threat- 
ened the punishment. 

The child has within him the cognition of physical neces- 
sity and could never act against the principle of contradic- 
tion ; but he can neither express it thus early, nor analyze 
it, nor understand it, if placed before him as a distinct 
proposition. 

The necessity of the voluntarily physical alternative is the 
earliest to be explicitly understood by him ; then comes the 
physical, and, lastly, the metaphysical. He must be pur- 
posely led through these gradations of disjunctive propo- 
sitions. Propositions of tliis kind, containing more than 
two parts, belong to the subsequent orders. 

earlier, i. e., This thing (or anything) must be or not be; but, although the human 
mind could never act against the truth of that proposition, yet I do not believe it 
capable of explicitly pronouncing it, or of understanding it, on hearing it pro- 
nounced, except through the series of syntheses and analyses which we have de- 
scribed. 



OBJECTS OF COGNITIONS OF THE FIFTH ORDER. 307 

ARTICLE II. 
OBJECTS OF THE COGNITIONS OF THE FIFTH ORDER. 

Section 1. — The Real and the Ideal. 

j4.— Numbers. 

381. The child, having arrived at this order, can acquire 
a distinct idea of the number four. 

In saying that the child can acquire a distinct idea of this 
number, I mean that he can learn to know all the relations 
between the number four and the preceding numbers ; and 
the arithmetic suited to this age consists in the study of 
these relations. He can, moreover, clear up the somewhat 
confused notions he already has of higher numbers ; for, 
being in possession of tiie number four, he has a new means 
of attaining them, by adding successively a predicate to 
four. What I have already said of the number three in the 
preceding order (no. 308) seems to me sufficient to explain 
all that can be required of the child in arithmetic at this 
stage, and in each of the subsequent ones. 

5. —Order of Value between Objects. 

382. Our pupil has already begun to form groups of things 
for himself (no. 309), and. he goes on with the formation 
of such groups in the fifth order. Those consisting of three 
objects are already easy to him, and he can conceive them 
distinctly. With regard, however, to his further progress 
in forming these groups, we leave it to the reader to accom- 
pany the child's steps through this and the following orders, 
contenting ourselves with having marked the age at which 
this work of grouping begins, and the law by which it pro- 
ceeds. We will note, instead, a new and important opera- 
tion, which the child enters upon at this age, i. e., the 
distribution of things in a certain order according to their 
value, real or supposed, absolute or relative. 

He has already, in the fourth order, begun to note mentally 



308 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

the differences (307). At first, indeed, he attends only to 
numerical or total differences, taking no heed of any others. 
These can scarcely be called differences. But he soon 
begins to note others, which become the basis of the various 
groups he proceeds to form. For the formation of one 
group only he does not require the knowledge of differences ; 
but he must have it to form two. Following, then, on the 
period of grouping and the period of differences, comes 
the period of order between several groups, or between the 
individuals which compose each of them. To place one 
thing or one group before another, not only he must know 
in what they differ in general, but he must further reflect 
that it is this difference which causes the one to be preferred 
before the other, to have more value than the other. Differ- 
ence, as a mere fact, begins to be distinctly recognized at 
the fourth order of cognitions ; the consequence drawn from 
it, to the advantage of the one and the disadvantage of 
the other of two different things, does not follow before the 
fifth order. 

C. — Time. 

383. At the fifth order of cognitions, the child is able to 
distinguish the three modes of time, i. e., to observe past 
events and distinguish them from the present, and the 
present from the future. This results from what we have 
already said regarding the progress of the infant mind in 
noting time in things (nos. 316-318). 

When the child has compared and distinguished a present 
from a past event, and has likewise compared the present 
event from one he foresees or imagines in the future, he is 
in a position to compare the past with the coming event, 
and thus to conceive the same event under the three. forms 
of time. 

At this age he also begins to form to himself, — always 
by means of words, — an idea of time, abstracted from 



REALITY AND IDEALITY. 309 

events. The abstraction of past, present, and future is 
based on the events he has conceived under two forms of 
time in the preceding period. 

At first, however, the child does not conceive the past in 
itself, but only as determined by some marked event : such 
as a meal that is over, or the past of yesterday, divided by 
the setting of the sun or by sleep from to-day. These are 
the earliest determinate parts he learns to know. Hence, 
not only shonld time be spoken of to the child in accordance 
with these gradations, but it should always be connected 
with events that make a marked impression on his mind and 
leave a lasting trace, as of so many epochs by the help of 
which he can fix his thought on what went before and what 
after them, and thus observe time in its various forms. 

* Z>. — Of the I. 

384. I have already shown that the child cannot under- 
stand the full significance of the monosyllable / until he has 
arrived, at least, at the fifth stage of his intellectual devel- 
opment (nos. 311 and foil.) 

In the first he perceives only external objects. Let us 
suppose that in the second he perceives actions. In that 
case, it will be only in the third, certainly not earlier, that 
he will attribute them to an agent ; but he will not 3^et rec- 
ognize that agent as himself, because he has not yet found 
himself amongst agents. At this point he can speak of 
himself only in the third person ; and this we have seen to 
be the case with children before they have mastered the 
meaning of the monosyllable /, and also with adults, if 
their intellectual development has been arrested at a certain 
stage by special circumstances. 

Not till he has reached the fourth order, in which the 
understanding begins to note distinctly the differences of 
things, will he be able, under the stimulus of language, 



310 ON THE RULING PEINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which his own wants and a natural tendency help him to 
understand, to distinguish himself from other agents : in 
other words, be led to perceive intellectually his ov/n funda- 
mental feeling, the man-feeling within, as the author of these 
actions. This is, indeed, a simple perception, and, as such, 
would belong to the first order of cognitions ; but, as we have 
seen, it does not take place at that time, because the want 
which impels to it is not yet felt. This want manifests itself 
now, in the necessity felt of attributing actions to an author, 
and, therefore, of attributing to that fundamental feeling, 
experienced by the human being, certain actions which, for 
that reason, he calls his own. The man cannot attribute 
these actions to the fundamental feeling he experiences, 
unless he has first perceived this feeling intellectually. 
Henceforward he is moved to reflect upon himself, ^. e., 
upon that fundamental feeling which constitutes his self. 

Thus, not till he has reached the fonrth order, or, even 
later, does man begin to understand the monosyllable /, as 
signifying that substantial feeling which he has and perceives 
as the author of actions. 

But even this, as already said, is not the full meaning of 
the monosyllable /. 

This monosyllable expresses, in addition, the identity be- 
tween him who knows and pronounces the / and the acting 
fundamental feeling expressing who it is that pronounces 
the I. It is evident that this identity cannot be understood 
until the fundamental acting feeling has been intellectually 
perceived, and, therefore, not before the fifth order. 

385. Nor does this suffice : at the fifth order man takes 
another step in the knowledge of himself. Having already, 
in the fourth order, arrived at the perception of the funda- 
mental feeling, by attributing actions to it, and having also 
conceived actions in two forms of time, the past and the 
present, or even the present and the future, he now, in the 



CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE EGO. 311 

fifth order, comes to observe that the acting principle felt 
and perceived is the same at both times, while the actions of 
this principle in the past and present are different. The 
identity of the I amidst varying actions and times is the 
new cognition which now appears, and which, gradually 
becoming firmer through continual experiences, increases 
indefinitely the knowledge of self. It is true that this iden- 
tity is not expressly and distinctly conceived and affirmed ; 
but it is implicitly felt and conceived, so that, from this 
time, man does nothing which involves a denial of it, nor 
ever acts in contradiction -to it. 

Section 2.— Morality, Moral Principles. 

A. — Beginnings of Remorse and of Conscience. 

386. The moral principle which has lighted the child's 
mind up to this point, as the guiding star of his individual 
activity, has been respect for nature and for the intelligent 
will made known to him. 

' This principle, become operative within him, has taken 
four forms, i. e., (1) benevolence; (2) assent; (3) belief; 

(4) obedience. In fact, the child naturally feels love, 
adopts the sentiments of those he lives with, trusts their 
word, and obeys their will. Instinct, undoubtedly, helps 
him in all this ; for the inclination to love, to sympathy, the 
tendency to receive what he is told, without any effort at 
contradiction, the spontaneous activity which allows itself 
to be swayed without resistance, are powerful helps towards 
the accomplishment of his moral duty, and God provides 
that, through them, duty shall be made easy and pleasant 
to a being too weak as yet to bear a struggle. But these 
instincts and others, whether animal or human, do not con- 
stitute morality, which depends, as we have said, on that 
intellectual light by which the human being sees the noble- 
ness and grandeur of the intelligence and will revealing 
themselves to him as benevolent. 



312 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Already, at the fourth order of cognitions, he feels and 
understands that he ought to feel, such esteem and affection 
for the intelligent will manifested to him that he unhesitat- 
ingly believes himself bound to submit to it all his own 
sensual instincts ; and if he yields to the latter he al- 
ready blushes with shame, hides himself, and is tormented 
with remorse. 

It is most important to observe this feeling of remorse 
which marks the child's entrance into the fifth order of 
cognitions. In the fourth he has understood that he is 
bound to conform himself, no matter at what cost, to the 
intelligent will manifested to him. When, later on, he 
infringes in action this well-known moral rule, and feels 
remorse at having done so, he has taken a step onwards and 
has reached the fifth order. 

But the remorse then felt is not altogether the same as 
that which will come in the sixth and otlier orders. We 
must here take careful note of this difference ; for it will 
help us to establish the rules or moral principles formed in 
the mind at the fifth order of cognitions. 

387. There can be no remorse ^ previous to the conception 
of the positive will of another intelligent being ; for before 
that the child can know no moral struggle. His action, 
which is entirely spontaneous, meets with no moral obstacles. 
Hence, his remorse marks for us his entrance into the fifth 
order of cognitions. But the remorse thus manifested dif- 
fers from what comes later, in not requiring for its display a 
clear notion of the imputability of actions, whereas, at a later 
stage, remorse is actually the effect of the child's imputing 
expressly to himself, by his inward judgment, the bad action 
he has committed. In fact, as we have seen (nos. 384 and 
foil.), the child at the fifth order has not yet attained to a 

1 Refer on this poiut to the Treatise oil the Consciencet B. I., c. 2, a. 3, §3; 
J3. II., c. 1. 



BEGINNINGS OF CONSCIENCE. 313 

completely clear conception of himself ; for, although he has 
come to know that some actions belong to that substan- 
tial feeling of which he is conscious, he does not yet 
know either where to find, or where to place, that feeling ; 
which is as much as to say that he does not yet recognize 
that that in him which judges, speaks, imputes, is, in fact, 
that feeling imputing to itself those bad actions. Moreover, 
in the fifth order, he is only generally conscious of the re- 
lation between the acts done and himself who has done 
them ; he cannot yet recognize this quality, which belongs to 
the following order ; hence to this order belongs imputation, 
properly so called (no. 378). 

''If these elements, which enter as causes and integral parts, 
into the remorse observed in adults who have sinned, are 
wanting in that of the child at the fifth order of cognition, 
what is the remorse he feels? Does it deserve the name of 
remorse, and can it have the same meaning as when applied 
to remorse fully developed? 

The human being, before he has arrived at the full con- 
sciousness of himself, is sufficiently aware of the existence 
of other beings to feel that they have a certain moral claim 
upon him. This claim is the moral obligation^ which is im- 
mediately manifested in all its binding force to the intelligent 
mind, before it takes the form of law.^ Now, if the child 
feels that moral claim, even before he can reflect upon him- 
self, he must, as a consequence, feel a corresponding shock 
and pain whenever he acts in opposition to it. This is a 
beginning of moral sentiment, which is aroused within him in 
the same manner as the sense of the claims of other beings, 
and is independent of any express judgment of imputation 
by which he judges and condemns himself as guilty. Be- 
tween the action whicli he conceives and commits, and the 

1 I have sliown the distinction between law and oblir/ation ( vis ohligandi ) in 
the Treatise on the Conscience, B. II., c. i. a. ii. ; B. III., Sect. II., c. iv. a. vi. §5. 



314 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

things whose claim upon him he feels, — say the respect 
due to their intelligence and will, — arises a discord of fact : 
a struggle begins in his soul, in the substantial feeling within 
him, which, being all feeling, is dismayed at this contest. 
This is the remorse which arises in the soul as a necessary, 
not a A^oluntary, phenomenon, a feeling similar to the pain 
from a wound ; for the soul, and even the moral element of 
the soul, has its physical laws, as unchangeable as those of 
bodies, and it is a mistake to believe that all that happens in 
the sphere of morality depends wholly upon the will, or is as 
impalpable as an idea, or as vague and fugitive as accidental 
affections. 

The mind, in its moral being, may, then, receive wounds 
and suffer pain from them, before it knows itself or has re- 
flected on its own personality ; and this is the remorse which 
belongs to the fifth order of cognitions. 

388. Remorse of this kind belongs to the moral sense and 
not properly to moral conscience ; but, when man arrives at 
a higher stage of intellectual development, he immediately, 
if he goes wrong, suffers a remorse which is the result of his 
consciousness of wrong-doing. 

Not that this primitive remorse is formed without the help 
of the intellect, — certainly not ; but the intellect does not 
produce it directly ; it does not condemn by an express judg- 
ment, the fear of which causes the inward pain called re- 
morse : the intellect only recognizes the wrong that is being 
done, so that the feeling of the being thus knowing it to be 
wrong is shocked when about to do it under the pressure of 
temptation. 

The remorse belonging to the sixth order, on the contrary, 
acquires a new element, that of imputation. Man has thus 
learned to know the /as a substantial* feeling, acting, know- 
ing, judging, and uttering itself. He not only attributes to 
this J, as to their author, the actions he has already recog- 



BEGINNINGS OF CONSCIENCE. 315 

nizecl, as bad, but be imputes them, in other words, he un- 
derstands that the /, author of these guilty actions, is 
deteriorated by them, and hence comes the sense of demerit 
and Wame. The man who, in this state, judges and con- 
demns himself, lies under the weight of this sentence, as 
under a new evil ; and a new bitterness is added to his re- 
morse, which thus becomes the offspring of his moral con- 
science. By the act of imputation, remorse is enlarged, 
integrated, and acquires a new element ; it is no longer a 
moral sensation^ but has become a real reproach or moral 
blame. 

It is true that, when this other remorse, appearing as re- 
proach and remonstrance from an internal and superior 
judge, is added to the immediate and actual remorse, it does 
not change the latter, but combines with it, to sting the heart 
of the sinner with a double pang. The earlier" feeling pre- 
pares the way for the later. The touch of this natural stina: 
often awakens reason to perceive and recognize the wrong 
and to place it before the miiid, in such guise that the man 
becomes conscious of, and blames himself for, his wrous- 
doing ; he is led to seek the cause of the uneasiness and 
suffering of his moral nature, and finds it in his wrono- 
action. 

We may, then, rightly call both these intermingled pains 
remorse^ and the later form of it may be considered the com- 
plement, or almost a new form, of the earlier. If they are to 
be divided, the first might be termed remorse of natural 2nety , 
because it springs from the violation of the moral principles 
within us, and the second remorse of conscience^ because it 
springs from the judgment by which we impute to ourselves 
the bad action committed : the first is a real relation (a dis- 
cord) between the 7, as an acting feeling, and tlie recognized 
claims of other beings ; the second is a real relation between 
the J5 as an acting feeling, and the sentence of condemnation 



316 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

pronounced by it on itself. Although, in the first, there is 
yet no moral conscience, there is something in it which stim- 
ulates and excites the conscience, so that it may be called 
the dawn of conscience. 

Hence we may conclude that the great moral maxim, 
''Follow conscience," is not yet formed in man at the fifth 
order of cognitions. What, then, are the moral principles of 
that order ? What is the new form taken by morality in the 
mind of man at that stage? These are the questions we 
have to answer. 

jB.— Moral Principles in the Fifth Order. — Duty of Moral Fortitude. 

389. The remorse manifested at this period, although 
imperfect, produces the moral instinct which bids us fly 
from evil and do oood. This follows so soon as remorse 
can be foreseen, or felt in anticipation of the action. Such 
an instinct is not yet, however, a true moral formula : it 
only leads quickly to a maxim, expressing rather a dictum 
of prudence than a moral* obligation. Now it is the 
formulae, the moral principles of this period, that we are 
in search of. 

To discover them, we must return to the order of moral 
development, and recall how morality made its appearance 
in the fourth order. 

We saw it manifest itself at that time, as a duty to con- 
form to the will of known intelligent beings, at whatever 
cost (no. 328). This principle contained a kind of collision 
between eudsemonological good and moral good, between 
subjective and objective good, involving the moral ne- 
cessity of sacrificing the latter to the former. But it 
must be noted that, at this period, the subjective good 
cannot be objectively perceived, man not having yet the 
consciousness of himself. It was, thus, the subject man, as 
moral subject, who, on the one hand, feeling pain and 



DAWN OF CONSCIENCE. 317 

pleasure, and, on the other, seeing duty, paid no heed to the 
former, but decided simply that here was duty and that it 
was aU. The identity of the sensitive and intelligent sub- 
ject can alone explain how this subject could dedicate and 
consecrate itself to what was thus prescribed by the intellect 
passing beyond the sense without considering it, without 
judging or comparing it, as if it had no existence. The 
necessity of obeying the command to do right is absolute, 
and, therefore, the man decides on that side, without even 
hearing a plea to the contrary : sense suffers and cries out 
against its pain ; but the intelligent I stops its ears, bent 
solely on what duty demands. In this way, and not as the 
result of any process of comparison, is the will of the intel- 
ligent being, when seen as duty, placed above all other things 
in the moraUty proper to the fourth order of cognitions. 

390. In the fifth begin those colUsions between duties 
which change the form of the earlier moral theory. I say 
' collisions between duties,' not between that which is duty 
and that which is not duty, but pleasure. This species of 
collision does not, strictly speaking, change the moral theory, 
though it influences practical morality ; for, as soon as the 
human being attends to the call of sense, refusing to be sac- 
rificed to duty, he enters into a new moral condition ; he is 
assailed by a new temptation, and requires new fortitude. 
The observation and attention which is given by the intelli- 
gence to the pain entailed by the fulfilment of duty adds 
a side precept, if I may so express it, to morality, which 
takes this form : Be strong against temptations. This does 
not concern itself with the form of the final duty, but rather 
presupposes it ; for, in the words " Be strong against temp- 
tations," the duty in the fulfilment of which we must be 
strong is not expressed, but implicitly admitted. Neverthe- 
less, it will be well to assign to the fifth order this precept 
which commands moral fortitude. Having touched on this 



318 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

by the way, we return to our statement, that, at the fifth 
order, we have the first appearance of a certain collision 
between duties ; and it is this collision which changes the 
formulae of moral obligation. 

C — Duty of Honoring in Preference the Will of the Most Worthy before All Others. 

391. The rule of the fourth order was that the will ot 
the intelligent being should be respected ; but, when the 
wills of several intelligences make themselves known which 
are not all in agreement, there arises a collision of duties, 
and the question. Which of these is to be preferred? — this 
is the moral problem which the child has to solve at the 
fifth order. Some solution he is constrained to find for 
himself, by the moral necessity of action, and this solu- 
tion becomes to him a new moral principle, a new formula 
expressing his obligation. 

Before we examine how he should sol\ e this diflScult ques- 
tion, let us see why it presents itself to him at this period 
and not earlier. 

In the first place, he must by this time have come in con- 
tact with several persons ; and it is impossible that they 
should all have been perfectly agreed, and all have been 
exactly alike in their kindness, their teaching, their author- 
ity, in dealing with him. Moreover, he has already learned 
that there is a Supreme Being, and a supreme will excellent 
and perfect above all, and he has come to distinguish, 
after some fashion, between this most excellent will and 
that of others whose goodness is limited. In the second 
place, he not only began, in the fifth order, to distinguish the 
differences of things, but to place them in a sort of order 
of value as between themselves, at any rate, as between any 
two (no. 381). 

This order between the things contemplated did not exist 
for him at an earlier period, and, therefore, he was unable 



DAWN OF CONSCIENCE. 319 

to assign their relative places to the intelligent wills which 
claimed his respect, and could give a preference to one over 
the others only b}^ a spontaneous and instinctive impulse, 
apart from any reason for it. But at the fifth order he is 
capable of a rational preference. How will he exercise it? 

There can be no doubt that he will deem that will to be 
preferred as worthiest which is the kindest, the most benefi- 
cent. It was the intrinsic goodness and dignity of the 
intelligence which first revealed to the child how essentially 
lovable and venerable is the intelligent, will. It is evident 
that the different degrees in which intelligent goodness man- 
ifests itself to him will determine and prescribe the degi'ees 
of his love and respect. This rule of the degrees of good- 
ness conferring their relative worth on the wills of intelligent 
beings is complete, absolute, and immutable. Goodness in- 
cludes intelligence, for intelligence is the condition and 
beginning of goodness ; it is good of a supremely noble kind 
of goodness ; it includes wisdom, and, above all, it includes 
voluntary goodness. 

But the application of the rule must vary ; for there is 
variety in the means possessed by the child for measuring 
goodness and its degrees. He is liable to error in judging 
the degree of goodness and worth in wills opposed to his 
and requiring his submission ; but his judgment, though 
wrong in itself, may be right in regard to him. It is always 
right when he takes into consideration all the degrees of 
goodness known to him : in one word, what he must measure 
is not the whole goodness of intelligent wills, but all that 
portion of it which is communicated and made manifest to 
him. 

392. It is, however, very possible that the judgment he 
pronounces at that age will be partial and unjust, and for 
this reason : When the child first bows before an intelligence 
which he perceives as external to himself, he performs a 



320 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

right act. His mind, as 3^et quite neutral, would easily 
move with equal inclination towards any other intelligence 
that might have revealed itself to him. But he very soon 
attaches himself to the persons who are haljitually about him, 
and whose tenderness supplies his wants, and this affection 
may become partial and exclusive, as we have seen (nos. 239 
and foil.) A simple physical affection is certainly not in it- 
self wrong ; but it may move the understanding to a false 
judgment, and, in that case, there is moral wrong, because 
the intellect obeys and assents, not to what is true, which 
alone has a rightful claim over it, but to the suggestions of 
the will which corrupt it. If, then, the child's affection has 
become exclusive and narrow from the first ; if these limits 
to natural benevolence have degenerated into jealousy, envy, 
ill-will, or other evil feelings ; if these are not mere sensa- 
tions, but real volitions, the fatal poison of sin has secretly 
entered the child's soul, and his understanding become a 
corrupt judge, his soul the seat of falsehood only. By these 
occult operations, the saddening depravity of the boy, the 
reckless corruption of the youth, the crimes of the adult, 
who is his own worst enemy, as well as that of society, are 
prepared in infancy. 

The goodness of others is thus manifested to the child in 
two ways, through his feelings and his understanding. 
Feeling begets the love of sense, which is natural and inno- 
cent, when it is given to those who are the nearest and 
kindest to him ; his understanding begets an appreciative 
love, which should be independent of the love of sense. If 
it be measured by the latter, the judgment is falsified and 
error and immorality follow ; but, if it exist side by side with 
the love of sense, yet remains unaffected by it, no harm is 
done. The appreciation, in which, as in germ, lies the 
whole of morality, remains sounds and true. 

The possibility of this deviation from the right track by 



DAWN OF CONSCIENCE. 321 

a child of such teuder age will be better understood if we 
consider that his appreciative volitions begin even earlier 
(no. 184) ; that he has already framed for himself abstrac- 
tions from actions, and from the goodness and excellence 
of actions ; that he can attribute them to a subject, and 
can, therefore, judge the subjects by their actions. His 
judgment will be sound if he does not arbitrarily condemn 
those whom he does not know to be guilty, and takes 
account of all the elements of good he can and does know, 
although he cannot have felt and experienced them all. 
Already two distinct things coexist within him, the ex- ' 
perience of good and the 'knowledge of good. It is on the 
latter, not the former, that his judgment should be formed. 
393. And here let us note that, as soon as the child 
comes to know an intelligence, he forms a certain idea of 
it, as unlimited and infinite in its dignity and goodness. 
But this idea of its goodness is perpetually being lessened, 
whether from painful effects arising to himself from that 
intelligence, or from his affections being set on some one 
finite intelligence and, therefore, withdrawn from others, 
or from imbibed prejudices and errors, or any 'other cause. 
These limitations are rightful in so far as they are true, 
and, if true, they cannot take away from intelligence its 
essential character of goodness. The beneficent effects 
of the intelligence are not what we love and appreciate ; 
they are only the data on which we found our love and 
appreciation of the intelligence whence they proceed, and 
^of which they attest the goodness. Hence, appreciation 
is not subjective, looking to the good effects experienced 
by the subject, but always objective, and finding its term 
in intelligent natures. This being premised, it follows that 
the knowledge of a greater and better intelligence — such 
as the Supreme Intelligence — should lead us to a higlier 
appreciation of it, even though we should not experience 



322 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

its effects. It is, as we have said, the potency of goodness, 
rather than its effects with regard to us, that we ought to 
love : it is the dignity of the intelligent being, rather than 
the accidental benefits it confers, which is the object of 
the moral act of appreciation. 

Nevertheless, it is certain that the amount of goodness 
we experience is one means of helping us to recognize the 
dignity and excellence of the intelligent, beneficent being. 
Let us see, then, what is the child's moral principle at that 
age ; which is the variable and which the invariable part 
of his morality. 

The principle and invariable part of the morality of a 
child at the fifth period is this : 

He esteems intelligent beings according to their dignity. 

I say ' of their dignity,' not ' of their goodness,' solely 
to indicate that the object of moral esteem is found not in 
the effects of goodness, but in the cause of those effects, 
which has such an intrinsic goodness that it may be fitly 
termed dignity and excellence. 

This principle to which the child has attained, though he 
is unable to put it into words, is so perfect and complete 
that it will never fail him, however long he may live and 
whatever may be his future development. He will never 
change his earlier moral principles, be it observed ; he will 
only round and complete them. 

394. But, this principle being safe, there remains a vari- 
able part in the child's morality which is found wholly in 
the applications he has to make of the principle. 

It is evident that, to apply it, he must first determine 
the degrees of dignity belonging to the intelligent beings 
known to him. But, as I have already pointed out, the data 
he possesses for this judgment vary. Hence, the older he 
grows, the better he will be able to form a right judgment 
as to the degrees of dignity belonging to the intelligent 



BEGINNING OF ABSTEACT MORAL PRINCIPLES. 323 

beings he is bound to honor, and which of them is to be 
preferred before others. He is thus led to a successive 
modification in the form of his morality. 

Z>. — Beginning of Abstract Moral Principles, as distinguished from the Concrete. 

395. The period at which the child begins to perceive 
that he must compare together the various intelligences 
known to him and their respective wills, so that in the 
conflict of duties, he may choose the highest, is of the 
utmost importance in his moral life, and deserves that we 
should pause a moment to consider and reflect upon it. 

In the first place, we must observe that this is the period 
when the mind passes from concrete moral principles to 
abstract or ideal principles. This is a passage of infinite 
importance. Let us try to form a clear idea of it. 

That an intelligent being, on first perceiving or recogniz- 
ing another intelligent being, rejoices and feels impelled 
to love and esteem it, — this is assuredly a moral fact. 
That an intelligent being, in whom this love and esteem 
have been awakened, should, likewise, incline to, and strive 
to bring itself into conformity with, the sentiments, thoughts, 
and will of another intelligent being, as soon as they be- 
come known to it, is also a purely moral fact; for every 
act of an intelligent will towards a being of like intelli- 
gence is a moral act. 

But moraUty, in this first stage, although good in itself, 
is as yet spontaneous and not voluntary ; the will is gently 
moved by that human instinct which lies in the very essence 
of the soul, without needing any previous deliberation. 

Moreover, when the child performs the above-mentioned 
moral acts towards intelligent beings, he undoubtedly feels 
the moral necessity of so acting, — the peremptory claims 
of the beings he perceives ; but he does not separate 
these claims from the beings that make them ; he does 



324 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

not abstract them into a distinct conception, much less 
formulate them in words ; no, the}^ are to him a real- 
ideal thing of which he feels the power. The nature of 
the intelligences communicating with him is a real effect ; 
the child's own conception of it is something ideal. From 
the union of the real effect and the idea arises that which 
I have called the concrete moral principle, and which is 
an intellective moral sentiment on which the human being 
acts through the moral instinct arising from that sentiment. 

396. But the whole state of things is changed, when the 
child, unable to conform himself at the same time to two 
contrary intelligent wills, is called upon to decide which 
is the better, and to hold to it. 

This choice may indeed be natural and spontaneous, when 
only subjective good or sensations are in question.^ It 
may also continue to be made for some time in virtue of 
the moral sense, because the moral claim, felt by the in- 
telligent moral soul as a spiritual force, asserts itself on 
the one side, and makes the child recognize the need of 
admitting it, under pain of contradicting his moral nature. 
I do not pretend to determine how long that time may 
last ; but, however long it may be, the moment must come 
when the question will cease to be one of affection, and 
will become one of appreciation between intelligent beings, 
especially when language has given the means of abstract- 
ing from these beings the notions expressed by the words, 
good, beautiful, etc., goodness, beaut}^, etc. These abstrac- 
tions are necessary to enable us to establish a true com- 
parison between two or more beings, and to mark which 
of them has the greater moral dignity.^ When they are 
once formed, we can, by their means, recognize which 
among several beings has most of goodness or beauty, etc. ; 
in one word, which is highest in being or dignity. 

1 See, for the operations of spontaneous toill, Anthropology, nos. 632-635, 

2 See New Essay, nos. 180 and following. 



BEGINNING OF ABSTRACT MORAL PRINCIPLES. 325 

- It is evident that, when the child has come to judge 
of beings in this manner, the beings tliemselves and their 
action upon him liave ceased to be his supreme moral 
standard ; for he has arrived at a higher standard, by which 
he judges them and their actions. This standard is, pre- 
cisely, the abstract notion of goodness, beauty, etc. ; in 
a word, the dignity of the being. 

397. Let us now compare the two standards. The first 
creates the actual intelligent being, making itself and its 
moral claim known to the child; the second is the ab- 
stract idea of goodness or of dignity, by which he meas- 
ures the degrees of that moral claim. The first, then, 
may be called a coyicrete standard, because it is something 
real, making itself felt, to which the being feeling it has 
added the ideal element necessary to complete the intel- 
lectual perception. The second is a mere idea, without 
any concrete reality ; an abstract notion, communicated to 
the mind and not to feeling. 

In the earlier moral stage, the standard or law has no 
separate existence for the child; it is identified with the 
beings towards whom his morality is exercised. In the 
second stage, this law exists independently of the beings 
who are the objects of morality; it belongs to an ideal 
world, the world of possibility. If no being were yet in 
existence, the standard we speak of would equally be 
conceived as necessary, eternal, referring to possible be- 
ings likewise eternal, and not requiring the existence of 
any real beings. 

At the first stage, the demands of the moral act are two 
only: (1) the doer ot good or evil; (2) the object to 
whom good or evil is done. At the later stage, the 
three elements of morality are fully developed and distinct : 
(1) the doer of good or evil; (2) the object of his good 
or evil action; (3 and lastly) the standard or rule by 



326 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

which it is done. It is only in this last case that morality 
finds its completion, and that its form, hitherto involved 
like the folded leaves of a rose, within its calyx, is fully 
developed. 

£?.— Increased Difficulty of Right Moral Conduct, from the Appearance in the Mind of 

Abstract Moral Standards. 

398. The passage from concrete to abstract moral stand- 
ards marks a great step in the moral development of man, 
considered only as a development ; but does it aid or injure 
the moral goodness in man? 

That it opens to him a door by which he can ascend to 
a higher moral perfection, and that this was the intention 
of nature, admits of no doubt. From that hour, then, the 
vocation of man, of humanity, becomes more august ; every- 
thing depends on his responding to it worthily. 

But is it an easy thing to enter this new arena and to run 
its course successfully? Is the moral goodness to which 
he is called, from the moment he is in possession of abstract 
standards, as easy for him as that to which he was destined, 
when his standards of action were still concrete^? 

It would be empty flattery of human nature to assert 
that this new and more excellent kind of morality, which 
consists in following the abstract standards of action, is 
easier for it than that of which the standards are concrete. 
It will be difficult for man to be good in this second stage 
of his moral life, in proportion to the higher standard of 
goodness by which he will be judged. Let us seek some 
explanation of this increased difficulty. 

399. In the first place, at the earlier stage, nature was 
his steady and gentle guide : he was led by spontaneous 
impulse, which always inclined truly, like the scales of a 
balance, where a simple scruple on one side or the other 
ends the equilibrium. At the second stage, on the contrary, 
man cannot act at once on the moral impulse of nature. 



EFFECT OF ABSTRACT MORAL STANDARD. 327 

Before he can act rightly, something more is required of 
him. He must first apply his abstract notion and judge 
of the relative value of entities. This, of itself, increases 
the difficulty. Moreover, this judgment must be impartial. 
To decide that one being is better than another requires 
that we should weigh solely what we know of it and 
all that we know of it : previous affections and sensa- 
tions should count for nothing, except so far as they 
give indications of goodness to the intellect. But how 
hard it is to preserve this integrity and impartiality of 
judgment in the use of his intellect, for man who is not 
pure intellect, but is full of animal and sensible wants, 
for the satisfaction of which he would always like to 
be backed even by intelligence, — I mean, by its judg- 
ment ! 

If the nature of man were perfect, without any admix- 
ture of evil, its sensations and instincts would be confined 
to their proper sphere. They would, perhaps, produce ac- 
tions independentl}' of the intellect (unless the proper 
force of the latter — the will — should oppose them) ; but 
they would not propel the intellect itself, or attempt to 
warp it into precipitate, rash, or false judgments. The 
two forces of affection and will would act of themselves, 
side by side, and thus, the judgment of the understanding 
remaining uncorrupted, there would be no immorality. 

But the actual fact is too often the opposite of this. 
Man has feelings, and becomes the slave of his feelings ; 
he is not satisfied unless he can press the understanding 
into their service also ; and thus he compels his reason to 
pronounce in their favor, without examining, or even seeing, 
the truth. 

The judgment, thus urged to pronounce, before a matter 
is made clear, can be preserved from error only by a great 



328 ON THE EULING PKINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

practical bent in favor of truth and virtue.^ This may 
show itself and be cultivated in earliest infancy, even 
before the struggle begins ; but, if this is neglected, there 
comes a time when the child has, on one side, an abstract 
standard, according to which he should judge ; on the other, 
stronger passions, which clamor for judgment in their favor. 
The former shows him the way, but does not impel hirii 
into it ; the latter impel him, but hide from him the right 
way, and he is without natural strength to resist their 
incitements. 

/". — Difficulty of Perfect Truthfulness for the Child. 

400. We have now the explanation of the great diflSculty 
which children have in keeping steadily to truth in their 
statements. 

Mme. de Saussure observes that "every action which 
does no immediate harm to any one seems innocent to the 
child." ^ The reason is that, to recognize the guilt of an 
action which harms no one, the child has to use an ideal 
standard ; whereas, to recognize the guilt of an action which 
inflicts pain requires only a concrete standard. But an ideal 
standard escapes his attention and makes little impression 
upon him ; whereas a concrete standard moves him effect- 
ually. 

Let us apply this general principle to the particular case 
of veracity, which stands thus : " Children who are so frank, 
so naive, are not always quite truthful ; they dissemble and 
exhibit a singular mixture of cunning and openness. Sym- 
pathy, that instinct which has so marvelously developed 

* The standard or law is, in itself, an idea and, as such, it can guide, but not 
impel, a man. The force which impels man to act in accordance with the idea 
is found in the energy of his will, which is drawn out by the beings in whose 
favor the abstract law has pronounced. The concrete standard, then, is not 
excluded, but rather remains, as a well-spring whence man draws his practical 
moral force. — See, for the full exposition of this doctrine, the Storia Com- 
paratlva e Critica del Sistemi intorno al Prlncipio dclla Morale, C. V., a. vi. 
» L. III., c. vi. 



TRUTHFULNESS. 329 



them, tends rather to mislead them in the use of lana:nao-e. 
In very earlj^ childhood, they consider it rather as meant for 
amusement, or for obtaining what they want, than for ex- 
pressing truth, of which they have little idea. Why should 
the child make his words agree with facts? What is the 
past, the historical truth, to him? He scarcely remembers it. 
What interests him is to be fondled, to get what he wants. 
You may cross-question hinj, as much as you like, as to what 
he has done ; he will give you no other answer than the one 
he thinks you wish for. / have done ivJiat tuould please you, 
would be his natural answer at two years old.^ . . . A kind 
of cunning seems innate in children : when they have learned 
to avoid falsehood in speech, they deceive in action. It 
is even a very complicated form of artifice. Yet the poor 
children do not make very profound combinations; but 
they seem born with certain instincts of hypocrisy, quick 
and subtle at the same time."^ 

These facts show how small is the influence of the ab- 
stract standard on the mind of children. 

When truthfulness is at one with sympathy, i. e., with 
the instinctive benevolence towards others, it is preserved. 
It is in that case that the child appears so frank and ingen- 
uous. Even when truthfulness is not actually opposed to 
sympathy, though not aided by it, it retains some power 
over the child: he quite understands that words should 
express what is really thought, that this is tacitly agreed 
upon among men, and that w^hosoever opens his mouth to 

1 The same habit of untruth is found in savages; but, in these, there is al- 
ready a developed selfishness, which does not exist in the child of two years old, 
who obeys his instincts rather than his false judgments. The savage deceives the 
stranger who asks his way, though he knows it will be a serious injury to hiin to be 
put on the wrong track. He cares nothing for the injury; he desires and intends it 
rather: he cares only for his own interest, at wliatever cost. The child would re- 
coil from it, if he saw that his fib would injure his mother, from whom he wants to 
get a sugar-plum or a toy. 

2 Mme. de Saussure, L. III., c. iv. 



330 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLj: OF METHOD. 

speak, is, by that act, imder an obligation to observe this 
agreement, and to use words to express what is true. 

But all this gets confused in the child's mind, or, at least, 
loses power over his will, when a sympathetic affection, or 
a sensation of any kind, comes into collision with the rule 
of veracity. It often happens that he then finds two moral 
standards at issue, the one concrete, that of benevolence, 
the other abstract, that of veracity. The first prevails over 
the second, although the second has far the greater authority 
in itself. 

401. Truthfulness has two reasons to recommend it. The 
one is its general utility to mankind ; the other, the intrinsic 
value of truth ; and the latter is the direct and intrinsic 
reason. 

The principle of general utility to mankind is included 
in the principle of benevolence already known to the child ; 
but he cannot take it into calculation ; and, even if he could 
in some degree, 3'et as soon as he found it clashing with 
a present and felt utility, the more ideal and general would 
yield in his mind to the lesser, but concrete and immediate, 
utility. Scarcel}^, at that age, has the child learned to 
subordinate one or two means to an end (no. 310) ; and 
the calculation of universal utility, following upon constant 
veracity, presupposes the subordination and coordination of 
a large number, and of a considerable series, of means to 
the end of that general utility. 

There is no great difficulty in immediately conceiving the 
intrinsic necessity of truthfulness. As we have already 
seen, every child, when undisturbed and untempted by pas- 
sion, sees and admits it. But this perception has no power 
over his will, when the latter is preoccupied by his affections 
for real beings. His attention is absorbed by tlie thing he 
loves ; and he voluntarily forgets, or rather leaves out of 
consideration, the necessity of truth, which yet is ever pres- 



TRUTHFULNESS. 331 

eut to him, however he may strive to look in every other 
direction not to see it. 

402. If we wish to reason out in words the duty of ve- 
racity, we may do it as follows : Whosoever spejil^s to 
another tacitly engages to speak the truth, using words 
according to their current meaning. Those to whom he 
speaks acquire, by that fact, a right not to be deceived. 
This right is of great value to the intelligent being, who 
abhors being deceived, even when he has no scruple in de- 
ceiving others. Thus, the child feels anger against any one 
wdio deceives him, by telling him what is not true, thereby 
showing that he quite feels deceit to be an offence towards 
a reasonable being, a violation of the dignity of the intelli- 
gent being, whose highest good is truth, whose proper evil 
is falsehood. Therefore, falsehood is sin, and truthfulness 
a duty. 

To feel the force of this deduction of the duty of truth, 
we must first thoroughly understand that the possession of 
truth is a great good, and most precious, to the intelligent 
being ; that falsehood is an evil to such a being, and deceit 
an offence against him. It is undeniable that the child 
understands all this, but equally so that it has little power 
over his will. The reason is that truth is an ideal thing, 
the value of which, though he feels it, does not greatly 
impress liim ; nor can he sufficiently dwell upon it, his mind 
being naturally taken up with real things. To the sublime 
idea of trutli the child gives but a passing glance, without 
being arrested by it : he uses it as a means, but never looks 
at it steadily and directly as an end, an object: it is too 
commonplace, too clear, too evident, too old a matter to 
interest and occupy him in itself ; this is the future work 
of the disciplined mind, of the heart chastened by the long 
practice of virtue. 



332 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

G. — How the three Categorical Moral Principles begin to manifest themselves clearly at this 

Period. 

403. Let us pause here aud thiuk over all that has been 
hitherto said, which will give us a most important result 
for a knowledge of the qualit}^ and tendency of the devel- 
opment of the child's moral faculties. 

Morality has undergone in his mind three substantial modi- 
fications, taking three successive forms ; but each succeed- 
ing form has not destroyed, but completed, the antecedent 
one : the second has completed the first ; the third, both the 
former ones. 

The first of these forms had for its object and standard 
the real intelligent being, and produced immediate benevo- 
lence. Put into words, it would be expressed thus : Prac- 
tically recognize moral beings for what they are (as towards 
thyself) . 

The second form had for its object the will of real intel- 
ligent beings, their beneficent will ; and its expression would 
be : Conform thyself to the beneficent will of intelligent 
beings. 

Lastly, the third form had for its term the ideal notion, 
the idea as a standard of action. When the man says to 
himself : I ought to prefer the best among several intelli- 
gences and several wills, he does not attach himself to this 
or that real being, but to the order indicated by the idea, 
so that this idea is listened to in preference to every incite- 
ment and attraction which may be exercised upon him by 
real beings. This form of morality may then be expressed 
thus : Do that which the notion or idea of things, by which 
their value is measured or weighed, shows thee thou ought- 
est to do. 

These three forms of morality are what we term the three 
categories of morality : every moral precept can be reduced 
to one or other of them. The first has for its foundation 



NOTION OF GOD. 333 

real being ; the second, moral being ; the third, ideal being. 
These are the three modes in which being subsists. The 
child, having arrived at the fifth order of cognitions, may, 
therefore, be said to have touched the whole of morality, 
since all its forms have been revealed to him. 

We must refer those who would inquire further into this 
ontological portion of Ethics, to our Treatise on the Con- 
science^ B. II., cap. III., art. ii. and iv. 

Section 3. — Notion of God. 

404. The child has already begun to know God as perfect 
nature and perfect being. This knowledge is- more and 
more developed and perfected, as he is led on to know the 
works of God and His commands. 

But, apart from this completing of the notion of God in 
the child's mind, God may become manifest to him in the 
fifth order of cognitions, as Judge and Rewarder of good 
and evil. It is a great extension of the child's thought, 
when he comes to know that whosoever is against God is 
lost, that whosoever is on His side is saved and destined 
to be blessed ; that he who disobe^^s His will incurs a fearful 
punishment, that he who obeys has an ineffable reward. 

This idea of remuneration, vividly impressed and kept up 
in the child's mind, will be a beacon-light in all storms of 
temptation. All the attributes of God are included in it, — 
power, wisdom, justice, goodness, the fact that He is the 
one good, the essential good, the complement, the very sub- 
sistence, of whatever is finite. Such knowledge is exactly 
fitted to the human mind, which grasps it eagerly when 
announced, and admits it as its own, as already known and 
familiar to it. Its truth shines so brightly that it excludes 
any possibility of hesitation or opposition. 



334 ON THE EULING PPJNCIPLE OF METHOD. 



CHAPTER II. 

DEVELOPMENT OF THE ACTIVE FACULTIES AND OF THE MORAL 
CONDITION OF THE CHILD IN THE FIFTH ORDER OF COGNI- 
TIONS. 

405. Some other matters regarding the intellectual devel- 
opment which takes place in the fifth order will be stated in 
this chapter, on account of the close connection they have 
with the development of the active and moral faculties 
of which we are now treating. 

* ARTICLE I. 

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHILD'S IMAGINATION, MAINLY CAUSED BY DEFINITE 
PRINCIPLES REGARDING THE ACTION OF THINGS. 

406. There is a time in the life of the child when imagi- 
nation takes an immense and rapid development. This 
happens, as a rule, about the third or fourth j-ear, which 
is the usual period for the fifth order of cognitions.^ This 
fact of the sudden activity of the imagination, which sub- 
sides again after a time, has to be explained ; and its reason 
is to be found precisely in the peculiar conditions of the 
mind which has reached the fifth order of cognitions. 

From the earliest dawn of life, the faculty of reproducing 
internally the sensations received by the external organs 
is specially active and vivid in the infant ; but this activity 
is wholly internal and does not manifest itself outwardly for 
the following reasons : 

The daily sensations received by the infant are few and 
uniform. These, indeed, are revived in his imagination, 
under certain circumstances, indications, or impulses which 
are fitted to recall them ; but the infant has, as yet, no free 

* " L'age de trois ou quatre ans est peut-etre celui ou les traits de I'imagina- 
tion enfantine sout les phis saillants." — Mme. Necker de Saussure, L. III., 

C. V. 



GROWTH OF IMAGINATION. 335 

use of his faculties ; he has not learned to direct the imagin- 
ative power he possesses ; nor is he conscious of any neces- 
sity or any object which should induce him to do so. 
He remains altogether passive, and the sensations recalled 
and renewed in his fantasy are recalled and renewed by 
accidental and unforeseen circumstances. Hence, there is 
no novelty of comljination in these revived impressions of 
his imagination ; his former sensations are faithfully repro- 
duced by them, and no more. All the immense wealth of 
imagination, acquired by the infinitely varied composition of 
images, is wanting to him. But these limits, wdiich, at first, 
restrain childish fancy, are rapidly outstripped. Sensations 
multiply, become connected, and are repeated with intense 
vividness, and the child, in proportion to his feeling, wants 
to feel more, and to gain both internal and external sensa- 
tions. He learns the art of stimulating for himself the 
nerves which subserve the internal motions of fancy, and 
thus to excite their images ; and this activity, which is at 
first spontaneous, rapidly increases with the child's inde- 
pendence of action. 

407. But all this fails to account for that period, brief 
and fugitive as it is, during which imagination, like a pow- 
erful sorcerer, rules all that lives, all that appears, within 
its realm. To arrive at the cause of such a phenomenon, 
we must consider : 

(1) That the imagination could not create events, com- 
pose fables and myths, unless the mind had already learned 
from experience how the beings in nature habitually act, 
in other words, unless it had formed definite principles with 
regard to the actions of things. 

(2) That, even then, the imagination would not act freely, 
if the principles formed were so definite, so bound down to 
the reality, that nothing could be added to nature, nothing 
could be thought of but what was altogether probable. 



336 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

In order, therefore, to give imagination its full scope, 
there must be some knowledge of the modes of action of 
the things that compose the universe, hut not full knowl- 
edge, — only ar partial, vague, and indefinite conception. In 
this imperfect condition of his knowledge, the child knows 
enough to feign things after the pattern of those which 
really happen in nature, and yet not enough to prevent him 
thinking anything probable which is not metaphysically im- 
possible. The limits of the probable are for him of the 
widest, those of the improbable, of the narrowest, dimen- 
sions. We have already seen that tlie child ha^ no other 
rule by which to measure the absurd than that of metaphy- 
sical absurdity ; and that he is, therefore, inclined to believe 
as possible, as true and real, whatever does not involve an 
intrinsic contradiction, — apparent to him ; for sometimes he 
does not perceive it. Physical possibility, wdiich to him ex- 
tends as far as metaphysical possibility, appears to his mind 
an immense and quite boundless field, which becomes the 
theatre of his imagination. But this intrinsic power could 
not juggle on so great a stage, if it had not first learned the 
art; i. e., if it had not some previous knowledge of those 
external things, and their modes of action, which are to be 
feigned and, to some extent, imitated. This art is learned 
as soon as the child, having perceived external things, 
begins to observe their actions, to form abstract notions of 
them, and to note some of their more general features 
and outlines, which will, indeed, limit, in some degree, the 
sphere of physical possibility in his mind, but yet leave it 
infinitely wider than it is in reality. 

408. Now, this condition of the child's mind is exactly 
that which answers to the fifth and sixth order of cogni- 
tions. 

At first, the action of nature seems to him unlimited, or, 
rather, it scarcely exists for him ; for he sees only those few 



GROWTH OF IMAGINATION. 337 

beings which have come within the range of his perception, 
and which his fancy, self -stirred, recalls and repeats to him. 
Later on, when he has already acquired some abstract ideas 
of actions, and has formed for himself some rough types 
of the workings of things, which he begins to do about the 
fourth order (nos. 318 and foil.), he is in possession of both 
the conditions required for the maximum activity of imagi- 
nation ; for, on the one hand, he can feign things and facts, 
having already abstract ideas to guide him, — the types 
furnished by experience, — and, on the other, he is not re- 
stricted in Jiis performance by any narrow law of probability, 
of which he is altogether ignorant, so that his imagination 
carries him freely through the enchanting spaces of a fan- 
tastic world, where he meets neither limits nor obstacles. 
But this happy condition, in which fancy knows how 
to move, and moves without an obstacle to impede it, a law 
to restrain it, lasts but a short time. The complexity of 
real things in nature, together with the added observations 
he is continually making of their modes of action, make 
him aware of more definite limits, within which the nature 
of their action must be confined ; the types of action he 
had formed for himself and which were mere vague out- 
lines, rather hieroglyphics than accurate designs, become 
more and more defined ; their forms are drawn with more 
exactness, they are colored with more of light and shade, 
and at last they receive the final touches which bring them 
to the likeness of reality. Every step he makes in this 
knowledge, every line added to the picture he has formed 
in his mind, and by which he completes it, is an enormous 
loss to his imaginative power. He learns how chimerical 
were most of his creations ; he condemns as gross, puerile, 
and absurd, an infinite number of inventions which, in 
his first ignorant simplicity, were to him most true, dear, 
and even important. Thus, advancing years continually 



338 THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

destroy the idols of fancy, which cease to please so soon as 
their falsity becomes too manifestly evident. 

"The pleasure of children in the simplest stories told 
them springs from the vivid representations of their fancy. 
The images it calls up are probably brighter, more highly 
colored, than real objects. A story is to them like a magic- 
kintern. There is no need to task invention to amuse them. 
Take a child as your main actor, add a cat or a horse, some 
accessory, in short, which makes up a picture, and give life 
to your story ; your auditor will listen eagerly : the interest 
you excite will be almost passionate. Every tim^ he meets 
you, he will make you tell your story over again." ^ 

But, before many years have gone by, your stories will 
have ceased to please ; to make them interesting, 3^ou will 
have to arrange them with more care : the time is coming 
when the child will demand true stories.^ 

409. This period of the extraordinary activity of fancy, 
which occurs in children in their third and fourth years, i. e., 
at the fifth and sixth order of cognitions, occurs also in the 
life of humanity. The ages of fable are found in the 
history of all races : the East, Greece, the Northern nations 
all have their myths ; the historians have everywhere been 
preceded by the poets. This mythical period has a longer 
or shorter duration, according as the childhood of the na- 
tions is more or less prolonged. 

Such fables cannot retain their hold over a people, when 
once accurate knowledge of the reality of things has made 
their illusions impossible. When the witches and ghosts 

* Mme. Necker de Saussure, U Education Progressive, L. III., c. v. 

2 As we have already pointed out, the child does not note the differences of 
things before the fourth order of cognitions. At the fifth, he is still little prac- 
tised in the knowledge of differences, and this is the reason of his difficulty in 
distinguishing the true from the false. He begins much earlier to observe the 
likenesses of things. Thus, it is enough for him to discover in a story or an imagi- 
nation something like truth ; he accepts it at once. If other parts of the story widely 
depart from likelihood, these are differences to which he pays no attention. 



TRUTH AND FACT. 339 

of the North were substituted in literature for the mythology 
of Greece, it was a sigu that the world would put up no 
longer with the childish fancies of Greece ; but the mistake 
was made of supposing that its new demands would be 
satisfied by another set of equally childish fancies, those 
of the North. The attempt was doomed to failure, and 
the Christian world now requires unadulterated truth. It 
would, however, be an error to imagine that that word 
truth means only the reaU which is but a part of it. Truth 
embraces a wider field ; it has its history and its poetry, and 
both are equally true. 

It happens, indeed, that a people whose whole activity 
is absorbed in the actual interests and positive concerns 
of life become altogether disinclined to general theories 
and to all of grandeur of the ideal world. They go to the 
contrary extreme, and, binding fancy hand and foot, that 
it may invent nothing new, they condemn it, as the utmost 
concession, to the mere reproduction of realities. Not that 
the imagination of these nations wants power, but its powers 
are chained. For the imaginative faculty must, to excite 
men's interest, produce a certain illusion, something which 
shall be recognized as having the likeness of truth ; but, in 
this case, value is attached only to reality, which so absorbs 
the mind as to ])e always present and leave no room for 
belief in anything else. The rest seems puerile and absurd, 
or, at any rate, no interest is felt in what is, or may be, 
unreal. All will recognize in this portrait the likeness of 
the Americans of the United States. 

Note of the Trans! afar. — The history and literature of the United States since 
the above was written by Rosmini amply refute this imputation. The great ac- 
tivity of religious life, in the Northern States especially, from their very first 
settlement, should have been sufficient to prove to him how large a place the ideal 
occupied even ui the hardest-headed and busiest portion of the population, — 

M. G. a. 



340 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

ARTICLE II, 
MORAL ADVANTAGE OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF IMAGINATION. 

410. Even yet we have not fully explained certain phe- 
nomena of the child's mind, at the time when his imagination 
becomes thus active. One of these phenomena is the fact 
that he often finds more pleasure in the imaginary than in 
the real. 

"It is a matter of surprise to some that children are 
satisfied with the rudest imitations. They are looked down 
upon for their want of feeling for art, while they should 
rather be admired for the force of imagination which renders 
such illusion possible. Mould a lump of wax into a figure, 
or cut one out of paper, and, provided it has something like 
legs and arms and a rounded piece for a head, it will be a 
man in the eyes of the child. This man will last for weeks ; 
the loss of a limb or two will make no difference ; and he will 
fill every part you choose to make him play. The child 
does not see the imperfect copy, but only the model in his 
own mind. The wax figure is to him only a symbol, on 
which he does not dwell. No matter though the symbol 
be ill-chosen and insignificant ; the young spirit penetrates 
the veil, arrives at the thing itself, and contemplates it in 
its true aspect. . . . Too exact imitations of things un- 
dergo the fate of the things themselves, of which the child 
soon tires. He admires them, is delighted with them, but 
his imagination is impeded by the exactness of their forms, 
which represent one thing only ; and how is he to be con- 
tented with one amusement? A toy soldier, fully equipped, 
is only a soldier ; it cannot represent his father or any other 
personage. It would seem as if the young mind felt its 
originality more strongly when, under the inspiration of the 
moment, it puts all things in requisition to realize its ex- 
pectations, and sees, in everything around, the instruments 



IMAGIJ^ATION IN CHILDREN. 341 

of its pleasure. A stool turned over is a boat, a carriage ; 
set on its legs, it becomes a horse or a table ; a bandbox 
becomes a house, a cupboard, a wagon, — anything. You 
should enter into his ideas, and, even before the time for 
useful toys, should provide the child with the means of con- 
structing for himself, rather than with things ready made." ^ 

The above words, while describing the play of childish 
imagination, treats also of some of the causes which tend 
to produce it. Undoubtedly, the child's pleasure in free 
activity, his delight in his own creations, and in finding ever 
new and fresh ones, capable, for the reasons we have men- 
tioned, of producing illusions at that age, help to explain 
the eagerness with which he gives himself over to this play 
of fancy and imagination. But why do we see no play of 
this kind among animals ? They also have imagination, and 
find pleasure in several images ; but, as has been admirably 
observed, when they have once found themselves deceived 
by imagination, as, for instance, by the grapes of Zeuxis, 
they turn away from all similar illusions, which are proper 
to man only. 

411. In fact, the imaginative activity of man is not of 
the senses only, but of the intellect, — imagination being 
directed and guided by abstract ideas, each of which is an 
unfinished type; after which endless other things may be 
created and fashioned ; and it is this which makes the im- 
aginings of man so much vaster than those of animals. 
But how could this intellectual activity, which accompanies 
the activity of the imagination, and so greatly increases the 
range and the charm of it, be the source of so much pleas- 

1 Mad. Necker de Saussure, L. III., c. v. 

Note of the Translator. — Here again Froebel and Rosmini are at one, and 
Froebel's Kindergarten system takes full account of the originating faculty in 
children. It is one of his fundamental principles to develop it and give it free 
play, and his Occupations furnish the materials with which the children exercise 
their fancy in the invention and combination of lines, colors, and moulded forms. 



342 ON THE KULING PEINCIPLE ,0F METHOD. 

lire, unless the objects which it presents were in themselves 
pleasing? It is, then, not activity, merely as activity, which 
makes the child delight in the imagined objects ; they must 
have some other attractive quality which he finds and enjoys 
in them. What is the nature of this attraction? 

If, as we have seen, -it is not the reality of things, which 
to him is wretchedly poor and narrow, that gives him pleas- 
ure, it must be the metaphysical entity of the things; 
in other words, he delights in the object, as object, caring 
little whether it be real or not ; he contemplates and enjoys 
the nature, the essence of things ; it is by this that he is 
charmed and captivated. 

This contemplation is full of delight, indeed, but it is 
wholly disinterested, and all the nobler that it is disengaged 
from the frigid reality. It is the instinctive desire to learn 
and know the being of things which impels and absorbs 
the child in the inward contemplation of his own spirit, 
regardless of the things without him : he is carried away by 
the craving of his mind to find, as it were, being, — as much 
of being as it can, — the degrees, the intrinsic order, the 
forms of that being, which are, in fact, the essence of finite 
things, and to feed upon it, as the noblest of food, vital, 
celestial. 

The objective, the entity in itself (not real, not ideal, but 
abstracted from these its primordial modes), is that which 
I term the metaphysical world. At this age, the child 
spreads his wings and flies towards it fearlessly. His mind 
clings to it with the same pleasure as the infant's lips to 
the mother's breast. This is the reason why, down to our 
day, so rich in experience, novels are so eagerly read. 
Does any one read them because he believes them to be 
true, and the events they relate to have actually happened? 
That would be simply childish. In reading them, we want 
to know about human nature and its modes of action. We 



THE OBJECT OF CHILDISH INTEREST. 343 

want to learn about the human heart, to see the bent of 
passion, the inner recesses of that heart, which, beating in 
so many different individuals, yet remains the same in all. 
In the same way, we look at portraits to know what the 
world of to-day is like ; we care nothing whether the painted 
image be intended for Mr. or Mrs. So-and-so : that is a 
matter-of-fact detail so unimportant, tiresome, and foreign 
to what we are looking for, that to know it would rather 
annoy than please us. 

412. The desire to know things as they are in themselves, 
in their objective essence, rather than in their accidental 
reality, is identical with the desire for knowledge. Knowl- 
edge, in its formal part, being nothing more than this, a man 
is not more learned and wise for knowing more or less of 
real and positive things. And this desire is one of the most 
powerful instincts of human nature : the mind throws itself 
into objective being, as its proper good, as soon as this is 
possible for it, as soon as it sees the way open to seize, were 
it only a crumb of it. 

This powerful tendency of the intelligent mind to con- 
template things as they are in themselves, and not as they 
are in the real world, throws light on many phenomena of 
human life. It will suffice here to point out the one which 
is most closely related to our subject. This is the ease and 
the rapidity with which the mind passes, and is compelled to 
pass, from one to another of similar things, that is, to make 
Ihe one serve as a sign or indication of the other. No 
matter though the likeness be slight, the sign imperfect, de- 
serving the name rather of an indication than a representa- 
tion, — the mind does not dwell on tliat imperfect reality, 
as we saw in the case of the wax or paper figures ; it passes 
on immediately to the true man, not, be it observed, the real 
man, for the child cares nothing about the existence of the 
latter ; he cares only for the man of whom he has already 



344 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

received the idea into his mind ; and precisely in the idea lies 
the essence. So true is it that this spontaneous passage 
from one thing to another, as different from it as a wax 
or paper figure from a man, is the result of the instinctive 
force which continually impels the mind to look to things 
as they are in themselves, such a passage, if we consider 
it, being always the passage from an external and material 
thing to an internal and objective one. And, even when 
it takes place from one external thing to another equally 
external, the mind always passes from the external thing 
to look, first, at that within itself, and then, from this inter- 
nal thing, it goes on to the other external one. 

The same observation explains the possibility of language. 
Note that the greater number of the sounds which make 
up speech indicate things as they are in their nature, not 
as they actually subsist. Now, how would it be possible 
for a child, on hearing the sounds, to think of the things to 
which they bear this analogy, if he were not inclined by na- 
ture to rush in thought to things as they are in themselves, 
at any impulse from without? Any one who has seen a 
school of deaf-mutes, and the incredible facility with which 
they learn to understand things from signs, will be con- 
vinced of this. The teachers have no need to tell the 
pupils beforehand that the gestures they use are signs : that 
is presupposed ; they know it of themselves ; for nature has 
taught it to them. It is nature that impels them to consider 
all external things, and not only the gestures of their teach- 
ers, as signs of other things, — of the nature, of the essence 
of things. But for this teaching of nature, it would be a 
hopeless task to make them understand it ; for the conception 
of a thing as a sign, and, above all, as a conventional sign, 
is in itself so difficult, so arbitrary in its meaning, and, 
T may add, so strange and wonderful, that if it had to be 
reached by reason, not by instinct, it would be impossible 



DEVELOPMENT OF IMAGINATION. 345 

for children, idiots, and deaf-mutes to receive, retain, and 
act upon it, as we see them do daily, without the slightest 
etfort. Man cannot rest in the real. He flies from it as 
the arrow from the bow, to reach, and plunge himself in, the 
nature of things, which is the object of his intellectual con- 
templation. Hence it is that, far from finding it difficult 
to think of one thing as the sign of another, he rather finds 
it impossible not to consider all real things as signs. Here 
we have the explanation of language, hieroglyphics, writing, 
mime tics, symbols, myths, all the arts of imitation, the 
most ancient language of enigmas, the wisdom in parables 
of the earliest peoples, of God's teaching of man ever by 
signs and figures, the interpretation of every occurrence 
by signs, whether falsely and arbitrarily, as by auspices, 
augurs, diviners, magicians among all nations, at all times, 
or truly, by inspired men, beginning from the early prophets, 
to whom God spoke in visions and signs, down to the 
Fathers of the Church and the interpreters of the Holy 
Scriptures, who, in the simplest facts of the Gospel, see, 
as it were, signified, moral and most profound mysteries.^ 

AKTICLE III. 

MORAL INJURY FROM THE DEVELOPMENT OF IMAGINATION. 

413. The tendency of man to contemplate things as they 
are in themselves is essentially moral, precisely because 
it is essentially objective ^ and entirely forgetful of the 
subject. 

If, then, the imagination developed in the child produced 
only this effect, if it were only an increase of the intellectual 

1 St. Augustine, in his golden little book, On ike Way of Catechising the Igno- 
rant, points out, as one means of pleasing a popular audience, the explaining and 
unfolding of such Scriptural passages as are mystical and figurative (Ch. XIII). 
That the Christian plebs should have found delight in this, results from human 
nature itself. 

2 How morality consists wholly in adherence to the objects of the mind, may he 
seen in the Principi della Scienza Morale, C. IV. 



346 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

contemplation of things in their metapliysical being, un- 
doubtedly it would assist moral goodness, without any 
countervailing evil. And so it would be, if the human 
instinct, which directs the action of the faculties, had no 
other motive power than the tendency of the intellect to fix 
itself on the being (entity) of things ; but it has another 
motive power, i. e., the pleasure it finds in the real. 

We must remember that man is a real being, and there- 
fore tends to real enjoyments. Although his intellect takes 
pleasure in the light of truth, in the vision of essences, 
yet there is in him another tendency, by the side of the first, 
which impels him towards all those real things which can 
give him pleasure. Thus, we see that human instinct has 
two impulses, the one towards being, considered in itself^ 
the other towards real being. These two impulses must 
guide the action of our minds into different channels. The 
purely intellectual tendency to behold things in their essen- 
tial being draws us away from the real, with which it has 
nothing to do; the tendency to enjoy the real brings us 
back to it. 

Hence it happens that what the child imagines he often 
looks upon as the essential nature of a thing, without 
troubling himself to inquire whether it be real or no. When 
this tendency prevails in him, he starts from the real, as 
a symbol, and ends at the essence of the thing, as that which 
was symbolized. The essence is here the end of the mind's 
action ; the contingent, the real thing, is only its starting- 
point and occasion. 

But if, in the real, he conceives something pleasant, and 
thus the second tendency comes into play ; his mind takes 
the contrary course: i. e., whatever he imagines, he easily 
believes to be real. In that case, his mind travels in pre- 
cisely the opposite direction ; it starts from the imaginary, 
and arrives at the real : imagination is the initial point, 
belief in reality, its term. 



ERRORS DUE TO IMAGINATION. 347 

414. It is plain that we have here the origin of many 
childish errors ; for, as the mind, starting from the real, 
and seeking being as it is in itself, finds, and holds by, the 
truth, so, when it starts from the imagination and contem- 
plation of the entity in itself and comes to see it as the real, 
it finds and embraces a falsehood. 

There is, indeed, an element of reality in imagination 
itself ; for it is feeling that is affected, and feeling is a reality 
and can be modified only by some real action. When our 
feelings are in any way affected, we conclude that a real 
agent exists ; nor, so far, are we mistaken. Our error 
begins when we try to determine what this real agent is, 
and decide that it mnst be that which it appears to be. 
This illusion is complete in dreams ; we never doubt the 
reality of the things they represent to us ; for the represen- 
tation, I. e., their action on our feelings, is perfect. Even 
when we are awake, if an image presents itself vividly to 
us, we are deluded by it, and, in spite of the effort of reason 
to undeceive us, we are moved as strongly as by the reality. 

"Illusion, when it reaches a certain point in the cliild, 
ceases to be voluntary: he cannot shake it off, and ^lius 
a sense of fear comes over him. As he bea^ins to doubt 
whether it is not more than play, he fancies himself on 
the brink of an unknown world, full of terrifying realities. 
Dance a rather large doll in front of a child of two years old, 
he will be delighted by it, so long as the motion is gentle ; 
but, if you toss it very high, making the arms move violently, 
he may, perhaps, laugh louder, but he clings to his mother, 
and his sudden changes of color, from red to white, show his 
internal disturbance. Those who have the gift of changing 
their faces by grimaces and gesticulation, often amuse them- 
selves with the startling effect tliey produce on children ; 
but we may observe that the children's pleasure is unalloyed 
only so long as they can recognize frequently the natural 



348 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

physiognomy of the actor through his disguises. If he goes 
on without interruption, and especially, if he keeps up one 
of the strange faces for any time, the child gets frightened. 
The idea of a transformation, of a fearful mingling of two 
beings into one, takes possession of him : he does not know 
what he is afraid of, yet he trembles. The possible has no 
limits for him. Darkness may conceal monsters and preci- 
pices : the pictured figures may come to life, throw them- 
selves upon him, and devour him ; phantoms may rise out 
of the ground ; the road becomes a cavern inhabited, per- 
haps, by fantastic beings. As soon as an idea presents 
itself to children, they give it a real, living form, and a 
vague terror conjures up spectres in their minds." 

The free will of the child has nothing to do with this state 
of things. His imaginations and fears are realities, and 
realities persuade and induce the mind to believe in them. 
Even if the child knew speculatively, and without any room 
for doubt, that his fears are groundless, that the spectres 
do not exist, 3^et the impression exists and the real commo- 
tion of feeling in himself. He suffers the impression of a 
reality. There is also the tendency to believe that objects 
are truly what they appear to him. This tendency, which 
supposes a being beneath appearances, is the offspring 
of the intelligence, which sees things only on condition of 
seeing beings in them. Hence, the mind sees them even 
where they are not ; for it is the easiest means of conceiving 
anything wished for. Otherwise, action would have to be 
suspended for such length of time as was needed to discover 
the true being with which the phenomena are connected. 

Although errors are thus produced in the infant mind, 
we cannot yet class them amongst those that are dangerous 
to morality. 

415. Nor can those be classed as dangerous errors which 
spring, as we have shown above, from other purely mental 



ERRORS DUE TO IMAGINATION. 349 

laws. We there said that the mind, in every perception, not 
only necessarily perceives a being, but, moreover, always 
supposes the perceived being to be the most perfect and 
absolute conceivable to it, given the quality and quantity 
of its cognitions. This great law of the intelligence is 
modified, in its application, by the state of the mind, ac- 
cording as it is more or less furnished with experience and 
knowledge ; so that the perfectly blank mind of the new-born 
child supposes the first being it perceives, and that smiles 
at it, to be unlimited, the supposition being uncontradicted 
by any other cognitions, of which as yet there are none. 
But, as soon as the child acquires such cognitions, he ceases 
to suppose the being perceived to be unlimited, such a 
supposition being contradicted by the knowledge he has 
acquired. His suppositions, however, are still as favorable 
as possible to the beings perceived by him, and he sets only 
such limits to them as are forced upon him by his growing 
experience and knowledge. He falls, therefore, into error 
in this way, being led into it by the principle of integration, 
and still further by his desire to arrive at a conclusion, by 
his craving to know. If he could suppose nothing, but only 
perceive; if he could control the motions of his intelligence, 
always aspiring vaguely towards the absolute, until he could 
see more clearly where to place the latter, he would avoid 
such errors. But these errors, which will correct themselves, 
little by little, as he grows older, are not dangerous to moral 
goodness. The dangerous errors are those which spring 
from fancy during childhood, when the child takes his im- 
aginations for realities, not forced to it by their real power 
over him, nor from the intellectual principle of integration, 
but solely because of his own desire to find them true, 
whether they be so or not. 

Not that these fictions are entirely of his own weaving ; 
for, properly speaking, he does not, of himself, imagine 



350 ON THE RULING PElNCiPLE OF METHOD. 

either good and evil, or wish to deceive himself ; nor is he 
responsible for the creations of his fancy. But, if the latter 
be excited b}^ external objects acting upon him, then he may 
be deluded by them, first, in the two ways above mentioned, 
and, later on, in the third. A good observer says: "Chil- 
dren, left to themselves, may be frightened by a real object, 
— a negro, a chimney-sweep, a mask, — and recall it with 
terror ; but they very seldom invent phantoms for them- 
selves. It is rare for them to be preoccupied by an idea 
which has not been suggested to them." This fact proves 
that they are made for the truth, and not for illusions. 

416. To such illusions they are driven by the action of 
external impulses. But to those which are voluntary, which 
we have declared to be morally dangerous, they are impelled 
solely by their own desires and affections. These regard 
either the past or the future, and direct imagination, so that 
it represents only that in either which is pleasant. Before 
this can occur, the child must have the conception of time, 
which greatly aids the activity of imagination, expatiating 
on the things that have happened and those expected to 
happen. The conception of these two modes of time is 
formed in the child's mind, as we have seen, when it has 
reached the fourth order of cognitions ; that of the three 
modes of time, the present, the past, and the future, is 
formed at the fifth order, and thus we see why voluntary 
illusions begin only at this age. 

These voluntary illusions are the result of allowing pleas- 
ure and pain to guide memory and imagination. The child, 
under this impulse, remembers and imagines vividly what- 
ever gives him pleasure, forgets, and has no imagination for, 
that which displeases him. It has been observed that " the 
child is a stranger to the feelings of yesterday. An accident 
which has been his fault is a past like any other, which 
ought not to be recalled. Every morning he wakes up with 



MORAL EFFECT OF IMAGINATION. 351 

the renewed feeling of innocence, and believes himself fully 
justified from all wrong-doing by simply saying, ' That was 
yesterday.' " Nevertheless, when the future is near and 
pleasant, he looks to it willingly enough. He will count 
the days to the holidays, and definite promises have a great 
influence over him. Threats, however, have the contrary 
effect. A distant pain is nothing to him. He does not 
beUeve in evil beforehand, and puts away the idea of it by 
simply saying : ' It will not happen for a long while.' " 

The imaginary hopes of childhood begin with the idea 
of future time and help to form it; for these hopes mark 
points in the future, as pleasures enjoyed and remembered, 
far more easily than pains mark points in the past. Now, 
the harm does not lie in the child's preference for the pleas- 
ant representations of the past or the pleasant expectations 
of the future, which is only natural. But, that he should 
give substance to these images, and, impelled by the love 
of pleasure, should" c/ioose to believe them real, this is the 
error which springs from an evil principle, and indicates 
a mind already warped from moral rectitude. If we look at 
the way in which the children of great people are spoiled, 
we shall find that the evil comes of allowing them to create 
an imaginary world for themselves, in which they occupy an 
equally imaginary position, and their thoughts and actions, 
starting from this false idea, are continually wronging the 
real persons of the real world, and making a continual abuse 
of the things that are real. Poor children ! Their thoughts, 
their judgments, their affections, their habits, all rest on a 
false foundation : they are betrayed by imagination, but only 
because the latter has been used as the magician to deceive 
and destroy them by parents, friends, teachers, and all about 
them, in fatal rivalry.^ 

1 On the mischief of bringinp; up a child in an unvatural position, it will be 
well to read Aladarae Guizot's sixth letter. 



352 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

417. This species of immoral errors is seen on a far 
larger scale in the history of the infancy of nations. The 
latter have not contented themselves with creating a multi- 
tude of phantoms : they have made them real beings, of 
which idolatry is a proof. And idolatry is not found only 
among the ancients or among savages : it has been truly 
said that it exists among Christian and civilized peoples ; 
for, wherever excessive passions exist, they demand idols of 
the imagination, in which they may believe, before which 
they may fall down and worship : they demand that it shall 
enlarge and metamorphose the boundaries of the real world 
and create within it another, more pleasing to their fancy. 
How true tjiis is, must be felt by all who have observed with 
any care the boundless delight of mankind in self-delu- 
sion. It is evident everywhere. In society, men want to be 
cheated by soft words, and are irritated b}'^ those who are 
too sincere and honest to deceive them. In literature, as in 
art, there are still some who lament the loss of mythology, 
or try to invent it anew. In history, we refuse to accept 
bare fact, or to believe it, unless recommended by some 
fable which it enshrines.^ It is the same with events and 
words ; we are impelled by some occult force to give sub- 
sistence to that beloved imagination v/hich has truly none. 
This it was that made Plato dread the poets and admit in 
the education of youth only lyrical poetry, which sang hymns 
to the gods or the praises of virtue and the virtuous.^ 

1 "'Listen to a true story which happened to me,' said an English colonel to 
his Indian hosts, and related to them one of his extraordinary adventures. They 
would listen, and then exclaim, ' That's not true,' in a tone of suspicion and cf»n- 
tempt. ' Listen, then, to a fable,' he would say again ; and they would cry out, 
' Tell us, tell us,' and hang breathless on his words. I do not know whether 
the readers of civilized society differ much or little from these poor dwellers in 
the wilds. I cannot tell why truth does not appear true enough to men to awaken 
a true affection." N. Tommaseo, Delia Bellezza Educatrice, Pensieri, P. IL 
XVI., c. iii. 

2 See the Phsedo, De Leg. II., and Rep. X. 



SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELFISHNESS. 353 

ARTICLE IV. 

/HE SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE CHILD AT THAT AGE, CONSIDERED IN RE- 
LATION TO MORALITY. — MORAL EVILS. — SELFISHNESS. 

418. At this point an important observation has to be 
made. The errors which arise from the development of 
fancy, and which I have shown in the hist chapter to ])e 
dangerous to the child's morality, cliange their nature, ac- 
cordino- as thev are considered at the ao;e when man has 
not yet the consciousness of himself, the concept of the I, 
or nt the later age, subsequent to his having attained that 
consciousness and concept. 

So long as man is ignorant of the meaning of that mono- 
syllable /, he is only a substantial feeling, acting by the 
laws of spontaneity : these laws are inherent in his nature, 
whether considered in its perfection or in its natural corrup- 
tion. But, from the moment that he has perceived himself, 
an immense change takes place in relation to his free moral 
action. 

It is evident that a subject which has not the intellectual 
perception of itself cannot make of self the object and end 
of voluntary action. For the will is that which acts to- 
wards an object known to the intellect, and, if the man 
has not yet become an object to his intellect, he cannot be 
the object of his will. Previous to the time, then, at which 
man acquires the consciousness of himself, knowledge of the 
/, he acts subjectiveh^ indeed, but cannot make himself the 
fixed aim of his actions. So soon, however, as he has attained 
that consciousness of self, he can make that self the term 
and scope of his will and action. What an immense revo- 
lution is thus introduced into the moral world of the child ! 

419. Selfishness'^ can begin only when man understands 

1 Merely subjective action, that is, the action of feeling not making an object of 
the subject feeling, is in itself neither interested nor disinterested, as I have shown 
in the Comparative History of Moral Systems. (Storia comparativa de'Sistemi 
morali), C. IV. art. iv. to which I refer the reader. 



354 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD.. 

himself. With the notion of the / begins, then, the possibil- 
ity^ of true selfishness. 

It is true that, even before he attains self -consciousness, 
a man may fall into moral error ; but the nature of the 
error is different. It can consist onty in the violence of 
spontaneous subjective impulse, leading to action against 
objective claims. This is, undoubtedly, a fault ; but it is 
rather indirectly and negatively wrong, than a direct and 
positive transgression. Let me explain : If two objects 
are before me, and I prefer the less to the more worthy, I 
may do it in two ways : first, I may be urged by a blind 
instinct to such vehement and rapid action, that I do wrong 
to the worthier object, not because I contemn it or prefer 
the less worthy one, but solely because I am carried away 
by the force of the blind impulse, which does not stop to 
consider the objects, and prevents my making any com- 
parison or judgment of their value ; second, I may delib- 
erately and freely choose the pleasure or advantage I find in 
the less worthy, in preference to the intrinsic value of the 
more worthy. In the first case I do wrong, indeed, but only 
indirectly and negatively, rather through the weakness and 
corruption of my nature than out of malice. In the second, 
I do wrong directly, positively, with malicious intent. Now, 
this second way of sinning almost always presupposes the 
consciousness of self ; it is a form of sin which generally, 
at any rate, arises from selfishness. For, if I deliberately 
choose between a pleasure or benefit to the subject, self, 
and my duty, I must have made this subjective pleasure or 
benefit, which I prefer, an object to my own understanding, 
so that the latter has that actual knowledge of it which 
prompts the will, not the mere feeling which begets the 
instinct ; and, if this pleasure or benefit concerns myself, if 
it consist in some aggrandizement of myself, if, in short, 
it belongs to my substantial feeling (that which I myself 



DEGREES OF SELFISHNESS. 355 

am) , I must be conscious of myself to conceive it, and this 
consciousness must, in any case, awaken and take form in 
the very act of choice. 

Thus it happens that, by his consciousness of self, man 
introduces into his perversity the most fatal of its elements, 
selfishness, by which he makes himself the end of his actions 
and sacrifices all else to himself. 

ARTICLE V. 
CONTINUATION. — TWO DEGREES OF SELFISHNESS. 

420. The selfishness which consists in making self the 
end of action, and which first appears at the age we are con- 
sidering, has two degrees : (1)" that which is born of forget- 
fuluess of others and thought of self only : (2) that which 
fully considers the interests of others, but only to sacrifice 
them to self. It is evident that this second degree is far 
worse than the first. 

The first is mostly the offspring of ignorance, and belongs 
to uneducated people. "A person whose mind has never 
gone beyond its own immediate concerns, is naturally least 
disposed to consider others. We know how difficult it is 
to make the lower classes understand anything which inter- 
feres, in the slightest degree, with their own interest. The 
more ignorant they are, the greater is the difficulty ; and it 
lies not only in their knowing nothing beyond, but mainly in 
this, that they can think of nothing beyond that which inter- 
ests them personally. By learning to carry our thoughts be- 
yond ourselves, to exercise our judgment on objects uncon- 
nected with ourselves, we acquire the power, and form the 
habit, of considering objects in themselves, and not only in 
relation to us. Knowledge generally preserves us from the 
narrowness which gives importance to insignificant things. 
We acquire soundness of judgment from the habit of com- 
parison, and, the wider the circle of our thoughts, the less 



356 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

are we prepared to make much of that which concerns our- 
selves." ^ This is the kind of selfishness which, in the 
world, interferes with, and bars, the noblest schemes, and 
when these have to be discussed in an assembly, it often 
happens that one or another individual gets up and opposes 
a great public good, on the ground of some infinitesimal 
private interest ; the most frivolous reason, a mere incon- 
venience which vanishes into nothingness, when compared 
with the benefit of the proposed measure, being sufficient 
to throw it out. 

It might be supposed that, in small countries, where pas- 
sions ^ are not so much excited, and the number of voters 
is smaller, the schemes for public good would have a bet- 
ter chance ; but this is not the case : what is wanting in 
violence or passion is made up by the selfishness of igno- 
rance. 

Children show this kind of selfishness whenever they find 
themselves with people who indulge them in everything. 
The habit of getting whatever they ask for prevents their 
ever considering the trouble they give to others, and they 
think only of their own pleasure. The character of Sophy, 
in Mad. Guizot's Letters, is an admirably portrayed example 
of this. 

The second degree of selfishness does not belong to this 
age ; it is the guilt of maturer minds. 

ARTICLE VI. 

CONTINUATION. — JUDGMENT BY TWO MEASURES, — CHILDISH ARTIFICES. 

421. The evil progeny of selfishness is legion. It causes 
man to apply a different measure to himself and to others, 
to what concerns himself and what concerns them. This is 

1 Mad. Guizot, Lett. XXXITI. 

* The context here shows that the negative has been omitted in the text by a 
clerical error. — M. G. G. 



MORAL APATHY. 357 

the fatal evil from which all moral evils take their form, and 
no watchfulness, no pains, can be too great to preserve a 
child from it. If education could succeed in maintaining 
his rectitude of mind and impartiality of judgment in every- 
thing down to the most trifling, it would make of him, in a 
short time, a perfect man. 

For the same reason, the cunning of children, their small 
but frequent untruths, assume a graver character, when they 
proceed from already formed selfishness. We make a great 
mistake in judging children solely by external facts, as they 
appear in their immediateness. The same fact, the same 
artifice, the same falsehood, may in two different children 
have an infinitely different moral significance. Insight, the 
discernment of inward motive, these are the prime gifts of 
the true educator. 

ARTICLE VII. 

MORAL APATHY AND RESTIVENESS. 

422. In the fifth order are also manifested the moral 
apathy and restiveness which constitute a most dangerous 
evil in children. 

We have seen that the desire to influence the will of others 
awakens in the child, in the preceding, ^. e., the fourth order, 
of cognitions, a desire which springs from the conflict be- 
tween the child's own will, which he does not want to give 
up, and that of others, which yet he feels he ought to re- 
spect and put above his own.^ But even the necessity of 
influencing the will of others, in order to bring it into accord 
with his own, is felt as a burden, a tie upon him, which he 
will bear only in proportion to his benevolent affections and 
moral feelings. 

1 At this age, the child does not know his own will objectively; hence, he cannot 
judge of Its moral worth or give it, in virtue of such judgment, precedence over 
another s. The latter, tlierefore, nlone has a right to the moral respect of a child 
Ot that age, his own will not having yet been morally valued. 



358 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

Now, there are times when affection has no power over the 
child's heart, and his moral feeling is dull and inert, through 
his absorption in something else. At such times, his state 
is deplorable. The will of others is an annoyance to him, 
every rule an odious bondage. Some monstrous caprice 
takes hold of him ; he persists in it, and delights in the 
display of his whole physical activity ; he feels himself the 
bigger for rebelling against the law and using, uncontrolled, 
his natural liberty. Those who have had much to do with 
children, must be well acquainted with this dangerous moral 
disease in them. 

The obstinacy of a child who, when learning to read, 
would always say b-a-u, bu, and refused to repeat 6-a-w, 
bau, is thus explained by Mad. Guizot, Lett. IX. : 

"Imitation, which is the effect of sympathy, leading men to 
repeat one another externally, as well as to assimilate themselves 
to each other internally, is the original source of grammatical 
usage, as it is also the prime factor in teaching. But the child 
gets tired of repeating sounds to which he attaches no meaning, 
and the instinct of imitation alone is not enough to sustain the 
more active exercise of will and effort of attention you are begin 
ning to require from him. He will then try the exercise of will on 
his own account, and you may expect a fit of obstinacy, all the 
more invincible that it is utterly without a ground in his own 
reason, and without a point of connection with yours. You want 
him to say bau ; he chooses to say hu ; the one seems to him as 
right as the other ; but, as it is he who has to pronounce it, he feels 
himself the master and will not let himself be coerced. All at- 
tempts to force him will be in vain ; he can say to you, as did the 
singer to the King of Prussia, who put her in prison because she 
would not sing : ' You have a thousand means of making me cry, 
but not one of making me sing.' He will find it easier to cry and 
scream than to pronounce the syllable you require, because he has 
a reason for crying over what vexes him, but none for doing what 
he does not like." 



SELFISHNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 359 

We quote the followiug additional facte, which may be 
verified by daily experience : 

" A little girl, so gentle and docile that she seemed to find her 
whole happiness in obedience, would every now and then deliglit 
in open rebellion. At eighteen months' old, she already showed 
this alternate desire to obey, and to break through, the rule im- 
posed upon her. One day, being alone with her mother, who was 
kept in bed by illness, she bm\st into open rebellion for no reason 
whatever. She threw upon the floor, in the middle of the room, 
dresses, bonnets, chairs, everything she could lay her hands upon, 
and danced and sang round the heap in wild delight, utterly re- 
gardless of her mother's serious anger. She well knew she was 
doing wrong; her flushed cheeks betrayed her pangs of conscience, 
but her pleasure consisted in suppressing them." ^ 

Now, although this joy in wild, absolute liberty, this 
desire to set everything at naught, does not appear all at 
once, till after the age when the desire to exercise influence 
in others has arisen, yet it may manifest itself earlier. 
It presupposes moral apathy and restiveness, cooling benev- 
olent feeling toward others, while dulling the understanding 
to the admiration and reverence due to the will of an in- 
telligent being. What part the angel of darkness may have 
in these often fortuitous and momentary phenomena, is a 
secret hidden from human investigation ; they are, assuredly 
diflflcult to explain by the ordinary laws governing human 
nature. 

When selfishness already exists in the human heart, the 
moral disease of which we speak assumes a more serious and 
malignant character. 

AUTICLE vin. 

MORAL ADVA^TAGES OF COXSCIOUSIfESS OF SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 

423. The discovery of self by the intellect, in other 
words, the attainment of self -consciousness, while it may, 

* Mad. Xecker de Saussure, L. III., c. vii. 



360 ON THE KULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

as we have seen, prove a rock on which moral goodness will 
be wrecked, ma}^ also, on the other hand, become the means 
of opening the way to a larger and happier life. 

And, in fact, the sense of our own moral dignity is not 
possible until we have arrived at the consciousness of our- 
selves. This consciousness is necessary to enable man to 
judge himself, to impute actions to himself, to understand the 
imputations of others, praise, blame, reward, punishment. 
Who but must see how incalculably great is this step ; how 
largely the means of moral action are acquired by it ; what 
a new form moralit}^ must assume, when the man can 
reflect on his own action, attribute it to himself, and feel 
that, if it is good, it ennobles him, if bad, it degrades and 
corrupts him 1 

ARTICLE IX, 

CONTINUATION. 

424. Among the moral advantages derived by man from 
self-consciousness, are the memory of things past and calcu- 
lation of things to come. The consciousness of self carries 
with it consciousness of our own identity at different times ; 
the notions of difference of time and of identity of self are 
relative to each other, and, hence, grow up |9a?'i 2^cl8su. 

We have already observed, how " the want of a notion of 
time impedes the child's moral progress. The blank in the 
past excludes pain : that in the future excludes fear ; and, 
although the idea of the consequences of actions would be 
a useful auxiliary to his conscience, yet the child gives it 
no weight in his decisions, because he cannot see distinctly 
how facts influence one another. His extreme mobility sub- 
jects him to impressions from every wind that blows ; his 
recollections, on which he does not dwell, fade away ; and, 
even if he retained the memory of events, his motives in 
the past would always be forgotten by him. Too variable 
to believe himself the same, he does not consider himself 



SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 361 

responsible for the child of yesterday, who is not the one of 
to-day. He lacks that sense of the succession of thoughts 
which gives us the idea of the /, and that of time, both very 
dependent on each other. An /, the immovable spectator 
of another / incessantly modified, and registering these 
modifications, this is what constitutes our identity, ^ and, 
through it, the morality of our conduct in life. But in the 
child nothing is yet fixed." ^ 

The gradations by which the child comes to know him- 
self, his own unity, his own identity, are well worthy of 
observation. There is a time when he can recognize that of 
others, while yet unaware of his own, for the reason already 
given, that his attention is first drawn to outward things, 
and only later on turns back upon itself. At that time he 
judges others differently from himself, and his judgment 
would seem to be unjust, and to work with two measures, 
though it is not really so. In this case, his different judg- 
ments of others and of himself does not arise from unfair 
partiality, but simply from his knowing others in a different 
way from himself; he perceives them to be the same at 

1 Properly speaking, oixr identity does not consist in one /, the spectator of 
another /,• for, if it were so, there would be two /'s and identity would be wanting. 
It is, however, true that, when we reflect on ourselves, we are subject to such an 
illusion and difficulty in perceiving ourselves, that we seem at times two or more 
beings, and as if two or more /'s existed in us. Still, the truth remains, that our 
identity consists properly in this, that the / recognizes itself as always the same 
through all the variations which it undergoes. Thus, the / is at once an immutable 
and a variable subject, and hence its apparent duality. Closer observation, how- 
ever, shows us that there is no contradiction in an identical principle, the immu- 
table subject of variations ; for the variations are actually included in the principle, 
so that the new appearance is not really a new thing, but only a new form, a new 
mode of that which existed before, and is the same principle developed, as the 
consequences of a principle are contained in it, and are the principle itself in 
larger action. All this belongs to the nature of a finite being, which is identical 
in potency and action, as a telescope is identical with its tubes more or less drawn 
out. It is tlie potency itself which thus alternately suffers diminution or exten- 
sion; both are there at once, independently of time. But this will be better treated 
of in the Ontology, should God permit us to produce it, 
2 Mad. Necker de Saussure, L, III., c. vi. 



362 ON THE RULING PRINCIPLE OF METHOD. 

different times, while he has not yet perceived this of him- 
self, and, therefore, he judges himself as a different person 
at one time from what he was at another. Let me again 
quote the observations of another: "Louisa, like all other 
children, is convinced that the whole thing is over when she 
has made amends for her fault, or has been forgiven for it. 
It does not occur to her that it can be brought up again 
as a subject of reproach, or be used as the ground of an 
opinion on the whole of her conduct and character. A child, 
entirely absorbed in the present, connects his fault neither 
with the past nor the future. If I tax Louisa with hav- 
ing already lost several pairs of gloves, she will answer, 
' Mamma, I have only lost one to-day ; ' and, if I reprove 
her for a fault constantly committed, she will say, 'But I 
am not doing it now.' Children never connect the idea of 
a fault with that of a defect or habit, and the words, ' I 
won't do it again,' are easier to them than the thought that 
they will begin again to-morrow doing the same they have 
done to-day. And thus, unless obliged, they will never ap- 
ply to themselves a general idea of vice or virtue. A child 
does not think of himself as good or bad ; no general view 
of his own character enters into his mind. And yet such 
a view is not foreign to him ; for only through its means 
is it so easy for him to form an idea of the character of 
others. If he hears a person spoken of, whether real or 
fictitious, his first question will be, ' Was he a good or a 
bad man? ' If you tell him the story of the death of Clitus, 
he will decide that Alexander was a very bad man, and re- 
fuse to listen to anything to the contrary ; and if he has 
been moved to compassion by the story of Hagar in the 
desert, he will altogether refuse to admit that Hagar could 
have behaved ill to Sarah, and will hold it certain that Hagar 
was good and Sarah bad."^ 

1 Mad. Guizot, Lett. XX, 



NATIONAL PREJUDICE. 363 

One fact, therefore, suffices for the child to judge of 
others, wlietlier tliey are bad or good ; but he forms no 
fixed judgment on himself, and judges his action only at the 
moment of committing it. 

425. These facts marlv out the period, a somewhat long 
one in childhood, during which the child has come to recog- 
nize the identity of others at various times, and can form a 
single, definite judgment about them as always the same sub- 
jects, while yet he has no notion of himself as the same at 
different times, and judges only his immediate action ; with 
this result, that his judgments vary with the varying quality 
of the actions, and involve no general or final sentence for, 
or against, himself. 

I have said that this period is somewhat prolonged in 
infant life ; and this holds good for the infancy of nations 
and for the common people, who, for the most part, remain 
children always. Why does a nation judge so severely the 
defects of another nation, but because it considers the latter 
as an individual, and, from particular actions, pronounces 
condemnation on the whole body? Whence comes popular 
passion, whether against those who are the objects of its 
hate, and in whom no good thing is admitted to exist, or in 
favor of those who are the objects of its love, in whom it 
can see no defects? 



END. 



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Nichols' Topics in Geography. " Contains excellent hints and sug- 
gestions of incalculable aid to school teachers." — Oakland {Cal. ) Tribune. . ©.Ss 



D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, 

BOSTON, NEW YORK AND CHICAGO. 



nibonoorapb6 on lEbucation. 



M 



ANY contributions to the theory or the practice of teaching are 
yearly lost to the profession, because they are embodied in articles 
which are too long, or too profound, or too limited as to number of inter- 
ested readers, for popular magazine articles, and yet not sufficient in vol- 
ume for books. We propose to publish from time to time, under the above 
title, just such essays, prepared by specialists, choice of matter, practical in 
treatment, and of unquestionable value to teachers. Our plan is to furnish 
the monographs in paper covers, and at low prices. We shall continue the 
series as long as teachers buy freely enough to allow the publishers to recover 
merely the money invested. Of these series the following are now ready : — 

Modern Petrography. 

By George Huntington Williams, of the Johns Hopkins University. 

TJie Study of Latin in the Preparatory Course. 

By Edward P. Morris, M.A., Professor of Latin, Williams College. 

Mathematical TeacJiing and its Modem Methods. 

By Truman Henry Safford, Ph.D., Professor of Astronomy in Williams College. 

Hozv to Teach Readiiig and What to Read in the Schools. 

By G. Stanley Hall, President of Clark University, Worcester, Mass. 

Science Teaching in the Schools. 

By William North Rice, Professor of Geology in Wesleyan University, Conn. 

English in the Preparatory Schools. 

By Ernest W. Huffcut, Instructor in Rhetoric in Cornell University. 

English in the Schools. 

By F. C. Woodward, Professor of English in the University of South Carolina 

The Study of RJietoric iji the College Course. 

By J. F. Genung, Professor of Rhetoric in Amherst College. 
PRICK, 25 CENTS EACH. 



D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, 

Boston, New York, and Chicago, 



The Laboratory Method 

In its Highest and Best Exemplification will be found in the 

following hooks : 

Sheldon's General History. — This book gives a collection of historic material 
which may be dealt with first-hand, as the pupil deals with the actual substance in 
Chemistry, and with the living plant in Botany, thus stimulating his historic sense 
and judgment. In wide and increasing use. {$i.6o.) 

Sheldon's Greek and Eoman History. — Contains the first 250 pages of the 
General History bound in this form for college preparatory, (^i.oo.) 

Hodgkin's Nineteenth Century Authors. — A laboratory method in Literature. 

The plan is to give concerning each author the date of his birth and death, a list of 
biographical writings concerning him, a list of significant facts in his life, the names 
of contemporary writers, a list of choice selections from his writings, a list of his 
best books, and a list of selected books regarding him. (^i.oo.) 

Shepard's Elements of Chemistry. — This book is a practical embodiment of 
the modern spirit of investigation. It places the student in the position of an in- 
vestigator, and calls into play mental faculties that are too often wholly neglected. 
It leads him to experiment, to observe, to think, to originate. In successful use in 
more than 250 schools and colleges. (^1.12.) (Briefer Course, 6octs.) 

Colton's Practical Zoology. — This book tells the student where to find his 
specimens ; how to observe their habits and habitats ; their metaphorphoses and 
modes of development ; how to collect and preserve ; and, finally, how to dissect 
them. In short, it is a guide to the study of animals rather than a mere descriptive 
zoology. (80 cts.) 

Chute's Practical Physics. — This book consists of a series of carefully selected 
exercises, both qualitative and quantitative in character, with directions regarding 
the preparation of apparatus, and the manner of conducting the experiments, together 
with suggestions about observing, note-taking and making inferences from data. 

(?I.I2.) 

The above books are only a few from the many that we publish for High Schools 
and Academies. We have a full series in French and German, and excellent works 
in Geology, Latin, Natural History, English, etc. Teachers looking for the BEST 
books should write for our complete catalogue, stating in what subjects they are 
specially interested. 



D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, 

5 Somerset St., Boston, 186 Wabash Ave., Chicago, 18 Astor Place, New York. 



NEW AND HELPFUL BOOKS FOR TEAOHERS. 



Topics in Geography, 

By W. F. NICHOLS, Principal of Hamilton School, Holyoke, Mass,_ 
Prepared especially for the use of the teachers and pupils ; they contain a comprehensive 
outline of all geographical facts usually taught in our best primary and grammar schools 
together with many excellent suggestions for increasing the interest of pupils by object lessons 
and language work in geography. It will be found a practical and useful guide, containing a 
vast deal of information concisely stated. A list of books for reference, including many 
interesting and reliable tales of travel is added. 

Price to Teachers, 65 cents. When introduced into classes, the price paid for sample 
copy will be credited.on bill sent with introduction order. 

A Manual of Geography. Modern Facts and 
Ancient Fancies in Geography, 

A book for Teachers. By JACQUES W. REDWAY. 

Renders the latesi discoveries of modern science, in reference to Geography, available for 
the use of teachers. A chapter on Out-of-door lessons shows what may be observed in the 
pupil's own neighborhood about earth-sculpture, and how the operation of the laws of erosion 
may be studied in the rills that form during a rain-storm. A chapter on clay and sand-model- 
ling and another on map-drawing are full of interesting information elsewhere difficult to 
obtain. Not only supplements the ordinary manual in matters of geographical science, but is 
full of useful hints to teachers, and of bright, interesting information for the general reader, 

Cloth, 175 pages. Price, 65 cents. 

The Earth in Space, 

A Manual of Astronomical Geography. By EDWARD P. JACKSON, Instructor in 
Scienge at the Boston Latin School. 77 pages. Cloth. Introduction price, 30 cents. 

Lately adopted for use in the Grammar Schools in Boston. 

Table of Contents. I. How we know that the Earth is Spherical; II. How we 
know that the Earth is flattened at the Poles; III. Latitude and Longitude; IV. Zones; 
V. How we know Dimensions and Distances; VI. Gradual Changes in Light and Heat 
during the Day and Year ; VII. How we know that the Earth rotates, — Apparent Daily 
Motion of the Heavens; VIII. How we know that the Earth revolves ; IX. The Inclina- 
tion of the A^cis,— The Sun's Declinations, — The Change of Seasons,— The Variation iu the 
Length of Day and Night, Appendix. 

Rick's Natural History Object Lessons, 

Supplies information on plants and their products, on animals and their uses, and gives 
specimen lessons. Fully illustrated, $1.50. 

Luddington s Illustrated Number Cards, 

3x5 inches, in colors, to teach by 
with a card of directions and suggest! 

Wilsons The State, 

Elements of Historical and Practical Politics. A text-book for advanced classes in high 
«:hools and colleges on the organization and functions of government, ^2.00 



3x5 inches, in colors, to teach by pictures combinations from one to ten. Nine sets, each 
with a card of directions and suggestive problems. In neat box, $.6$ 



Wilsons U, S. Government, 

For grammar and high schools, $.50 



D. C. HEATH & CO., Publisliers, Boston, New York and Chicago. 



New Books on Education, 

\ do not think that you have ever printed a book on education that is not worthy to go on 
any "Teacher's Reading List," and the best list. — Dr. William T. Harris. 

Compayre s History of Pedagogy. 

Translated by Professor W. H. Payne, University of Michigan. Price by mail, $1.75. 
The best and most compi hensive history of education in English. — Dr. G. S. Hall. 

GilVs Systems of Education. 

An account of the systems advocated by eminent educationists. Price by mail, $1.10. 

I can say truly that I think it eminently worthy of a place on the Chautauqua Reading 
I-ist, because it treats ably of the Lancaster and Bell movement in Education, — a very 
'mportant phase. — Dr. William T. Harris. 

Radestock's Habit in Educatio7i. 

With an Introduction by Dr. G. Stanley Hall. Price by mail, 65 cents. 
It will prove a rare "find" to teachers who are seeking to ground themselves in the 
philosophy of their art. — E. H. Russell, Prin. of Normal School, Worcester, Mass. 

Rousseau s Emile. 

. * 

Price by mail, 85 cents. , 

There are fifty pages of Emile that should be bound in velvet and gold. — Voltaire. 

Perhaps the most influential book ever written on the subject of education. — R. H. QuiCK. 

Pestalozzis Leonard and Gertrude. 

With an Introduction by D,r. G. Stanley Hall. Price by mail, 85 cents. 
If we except Rousseau's " Emile " only, no more important educational book has appeared 
for a century and a half than Pestalozzi's " Leonard and Gertrude." — The Nation. 

Richters Lev ana ; The Doctri?ie of Education. 

A book that will tend to build up that department of education which is most negkcted 
and yet needs most care — home training. Price by mail, $1.35. 

A spirited and scholarly book. — Profi W. H. Payne, University of Michigan. 

Rosmi^iis Method in Edtication-. 

Price by mail, $1.75. 

The best of the Italian books on education. — Editor London yournai of Education. 

HalVs Methods of Teaching History. 

A symposium of eminent teachers of history. Price by mail, $1.40. 

Its excellence and helpfulness ought to secure it many readers. — The Nation. 

Bibliography of Pedagogical Literatiire. 

Carefully selected and annotated by Dr. G. Stanley Hall. Price by mail, $1.75, 

Lectures to Kinder gartners. 

By Elizabeth P. Peabody. Price by mail, $1.10. 

Monographs on Education. (25 cents each.) 

D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, 

BOSTON, NEW YORK, AND CHICAGO. 



EDUCATION, 



The Study of Rhetoric in the College Course. 

By J. F. Genung, Professor of Rhetoric in Amherst College. 5 by 7^ 
inches. Paper. 32 pages. Price by mail, 25 cents. 



THIS book is the outcome of the author's close and continued inquiry 
into the scope and limits of rhetorical study as pursued by under- 
graduates, and of his application of his ideas to the organization of a 
progressive rhetorical course. The first part defines the place of rhet- 
oric among the college studies, and the more libeial estimate of its scope 
required by the present state of learning and literature. This is fol- 
lowed by a discussion of what may and should be done, as the m.ost 
practical discipline of students, toward the making of literature. Finally, 
a systematized and progressive course in rhetoric is sketched, being 
mainly the course already tried and approved by the author's own 
classes. 



Hiram Corson, Prof, of English 
Literature, Cornell Univ. : I think the 
general views and the special methods 
presented by Professor Genung, in his 
article on The Study of Rhetoric in the 
College Course, are admirable. Perhaps 
there never was a time, in the whole his- 
tory of education, when it was more im- 
portant than at present, that students 
should be encouraged and trained to 
take what might be called active attitudes 
toward things and subjects. There is 
an almost irresistible temptation in these 
days to become a mere absorber, acqui- 
sition being made, in our schools, the 
all in all. The consequence is, that 
students who are most energetic in ac- 
quiring knowledge are averse to that 
independent, self-sustained effort which 
productiveness demands. 

W. C. "Wilkinson, Author of vari- 
ous Chautauqua text-books : I have just 
been reading, in your admirable series 
of Monographs on Education, Prof. Ge- 
nung's Study of Rhetoric, and I cannot 
refrain from expressing to you the sense 
I have of the value of the service you 
are rendering to the cause of education 



in making such essays accessible to 
teachers and to the general public. This 
particular monograph almost deserves to 
be described prophetically as an" epoch- 
making" production — in its own sphere. 
I have never anywhere else seen so much 
good sense expressed on the subject of 
which it treats, and the style is example 
and demonstration. {June 11, 1887.) 

Mary Sheldon Barnes, Oswego, 
N. V. : It is admirable, and cannot fail to 
be of real use to many teachers. I can- 
not see how his method and course could 
be improved. 

The Morning' Star, Boston : As 
the study of rhetoric is coming more 
and more to be recognized as of prac- 
tical value, — a study that should stand 
second to no other in an educational 
course, — it is well that Professor Genung 
has put within the reach of teachers 
this little book. Certainly all will agree 
that the facilities of studying and using 
our mother tongue ought to be as good, 
and as enthusiastically applied, as those 
for studying the Greek and Latin lan- 
guages. The book is a good one. 



What riUSiC System shaH we introduce? 

Dr. Wm. T. Harris, U. S. Commissioner of Education, in his recent 
report to Congress on the condition of the public schools of the District 
of Columbia, says : — 

" It seems that vocal music is almost entirely confined to the 
learning of musical notation. Even this is taught to pupils in 
the lowest grade while the pupil is taking the first step just de- 
scribed of learning to read from printed words. 

" It would appear that musical notation ought not to be begun 
until the third grade at the very earliest. The special music 
teacher ought to teach a large number of choice songs by rote, 
taking care to secure good expression from the pupils and to cor- 
rect the errors which are always taking root in class singing. 

" Another very important reflection forced itself on the attention 
of the Commissioner and his assistants in this investigation. 
Special teachers should rarely if ever be employed for any other 
purpose than to reinforce the work of the regular teacher. The 
music teacher should instruct in new songs, correct bad tenden- 
cies, and chiefly by his lesson show the regular class teacher how 
to conduct the singing." 



The Whiting Music Series, published by D. C. Heath & Co, 

of Boston, is better adapted than any other system before the 

public to promote the work called for by Dr. Harris. The ex^ 

ceptionally tuneful and enjoyable quality of its exercises and songs 

delights the children, and the very superior grading of the series 

makes the work easy for the teacher. The First Reader contains 

forty choice rote songs, and will by its method prevent the defect 

mentioned in Dr. Harris's first paragraph. 

(over.) 



What System of Drawing 



shall 1 in = 
troduce? 



Dr. Wm. T. Harris in his recent report to Congress on ttie condi- 
tion of schools of the District of Columbia, says : — 

" In drawing, the Commissioner's assistant, Dr. L. R. Klemm, 
notes the absence of a central controlUng power. He calls at- 
tention again and again to the inaccuracy of the work observed 
by him both in the colored and in the white schools. The 
Commissioner is disposed to explain the defects in drawing by the 
too early neglect of exercises in drawing from the fiat. Drawing 
has an alphabet which must be learned first before one can spell 
with it. Place a pupil before an object and tell him to draw it 
and he will not know what lines to use for this purpose unless he 
has learned by drawing from good drawings what lines produce 
the appearances desired. What raw pupil would know how to 
represent a cylinder or a sphere — what parts to shade and what 
parts to leave entirely blank — before he has learned this lesson 
by studying and reproducing good drawings given him ? 

"After the alphabet of representing form is learned by copying 
a progressive series of drawing lessons, the pupil should certainly 
be set at drawing from models." 

Thompson's System of Industrial and Educational Drawing, 
published by D. C. Heath & Co. of Boston, is specially com- 
mended by Dr. Harris, because its plan is in exact conformity 
with the correct principles above set forth. 



The entire System consists of the following Series of Drawing Books and Manuals : — 

1. Manual Training Series ; Two Manuals. 

2. Primary Free Hand Series ; Four Drawing Books and Manual. 

3. Advanced Free Hand Series ; Four Drawing Books and Manual. 

4. Model and Object Series ; Three Drawing Books and Manual. 

5. Aesthetic Series ; Six Books and Manual. 

6. Mechanical Series ; Six Drawing Books and Manual. 

7. Institute Series; Two Drawing Books. (over.) 



Methods of Teaching and Sf tidying History. 

Edited by ti. STANLEY Hall, Professor of I'sychoiogy and Pedagogy in 
Johns Hopkins University. i2mo, 400 pages. Mailing price, ^1.50^ In- 
troduction price, $1.20. 

*~PHIS book gathers together, in the form most likely to be of direct 
practical utility to teachers, and especially students and readers 
of history, generally, the opinions and modes of instruction, actual or 
ideal, of eminent and representative specialists in each department. 
The following Table of Contents will give a good idea of the plan and 
scope of this valuable book : — 



Introduction. By the Editor, 

Methods of Teaching American History. 

By Dr. A. B. Hart, Harvard University. 

The Practical Method in 7'xgher Histori- 
cal Instruction. By \ ^ofessor Ephraim 
Emcrton, of Harvard University. 

On Methods of Teaching Political Econ- 
omy. By Dr. Richard T. Ely, Johns Hop- 
kins University. 

Historical Instruction in the Course of 
History and Political Science at Cor- 
nel! University. By President Andrew 
D. White, Cornell University. 

Advice to an Inexperienced Teacher of 
IIis,tory. By W. C. Collar, A.M., Head 
Master of Roxbury Latin School. 

A Plea for Archaeological Instruction. 

By Joseph Thacher Clarke, Director of the 
Assos Expedition. 

The Use of a Public Library in the Study 
of History. By William E. Foster, Libra- 
rian of the Providence Public Library. 

Special Methods of Historical Study. By 

Professor Herbert B. Adams, Johns Hop- 
kins University, 

Ihe Philosophy of the State and of His- 



tory. By Professor George S. Morris, 
Michigan and Johns Hopkins Universities, 

The Courses of Study in History, Roman 
Lawi, and Political Economy at Har- 
vard University. By Dr. Henry E. Scott, 
Harvard University. 

The Teaching of History. By Professor 
J. JL Seeley, Cambridge University, Eng- 
land. 

On Methods of Teaching History. By 

Professor C. K. Adams, Michigan Univer- 
sity. 

On Methods of Historical Study and Kc- 
search in Columbia University. B>i 

Professor John W. Burgess, Columbia Uni 
versity. 

Physical Geography and History. 

Why do Cliildren Dislike History! B^, 

Thomas Wentvvorth Higginson. 

Gradation and the Topical Method of 
Historical Study ; Historical Litera- 
ture and Authorities ; Books for Col- 
lateral Reading. By Professor W. F. 
Allen, Wisconsin University. 

Bibliography of Church History. By 

Rev. John Alonzo Fisher, Johns Hopkins 

University, 



D. C. HEATH & CO., Publishers, 

Boston, New York, and Chicago. 



